ED 530



"Visitor or Resident" video
Feb. 13, 2012
I enjoyed the perspective of visitor and resident from this video. I feel I may be in between the two, depending on what my purpose fro using the internet is. I have a Facebook account and feel like a resident there. I am from NJ and I have a lot of friends and family back east, so Facebook serves as a "resident" space for me to stay in touch with them. I check it every day and try to maintain a clean Facebook page, or have good Netiquette, when posting. I do have an online presence and therefore feel that I am a resident in that aspect. 
On the other hand, I do not spend too much time on the internet maintaining a presence outside of Facebook. I feel I need to balance my "online" time with "outside" time. I think I will become more of a resident as time goes on, but I will personally balance my time spent online with face-to-face time.


Response to "Do We Need Grades?" video (Daniel Pink)
March 6,2012

I'm not sure wether kids would learn more or less without grades as a whole, but I bet some students would thrive and some would sink without them. I think a big part of a student's success is with the students' expectations of school. Agreeing with Pink's statement, I felt in college that if I went to class, did your work and performed well on tests, I should DESERVE an A. Whether I "learned" or not was up to me; the subjects I was interested in I learned more, and the subjects I did not prefer I have already forgotten. 
     I recently had a discussion with a cohort peer about grades in science. Each content area is a little different. I would not grade and art class in the same manner as a math or science class. In science, we have to measure certain abilities using calculations, theoretical concepts, and strait memorization. There are creative aspects to science, and I feel they should be measured, but there are many technical concepts to master as well. 
As a chemistry teacher, my overall concerns would be: 1. Does this student understand chemical CONCEPTS, 2. Can this student perform the tasks expected of them at a job in the science field, and 3. Can they demonstrate this to me on an assessment. 
     Grades can be weighted differently in my opinion. I think in science we need to have "standardized" types of assessments to ensure content competency, similar to TPA's, Bar exams, CPA exams, etc. This ensures a minimum level of understanding and competency. However, as a high school teacher, I also want to keep students engaged and learning authentically, and therefore I would also include appropriately weighted grades for more artistic, creative, applied, authentic, and unique works and/or assessments. I could ask a student to DRAW an atom and label it's parts as opposed to giving a multiple choice exam. 
     Grades are needed in Science. It gives teachers a means to measure a student's ability level. HOW we weight the grades and check for understanding will be up to the teacher, and I feel it he or she should be aware of what their grades stand for (have a solid grading philosophy). For myself, I want include participation, content competency, concept understanding and application, higher order thinking skills, and problem solving in my grades. What values or measures do you want to back your grades with in your class?




Disrupting Class Chapters 1-5

March 10, 2012

Chapter 1: Why Schools Struggle to Teach Differently when each Student Learns Differently
1. Explain the difference between interdependence and modularity.  How is education currently organized?  

Interdependence is a design where the way one component is made depends on the way the other component is made. Henry Ford’s steel dilemma; changing the metallurgy of the steel would in turn affect the design of the dies (metal stamping machines) due to metal rebounding after stamping.
Modularity is a different design where there are no interdependence's between components. The light bulb is an example. bulbs morphed from iridescent to compact fluorescent, but the base and socket are the same.
Public schools:
Architecture is interdependent (4 types)

  • Temporal: can’ study this in 9th grade unless you covered it in 7th grade
  • Lateral: cant teach foreign language in more effective ways unless you teach English in more effective ways
  • Physical: evidence supports project-based learning is motivating, allows students to synthesize their own learning, finding their own gaps in knowledge. There may be geographic restrictions depending on where school is located.
  • Hierarchical: Teachers may want to teach algebra in chemistry class, but it would be nearly impossible because what gets taught in the classroom is mandated by the district’s defined curriculum . Change in teaching practices would also mean a change in the way we certify our teachers. (interdependency)

Special Education
“Because students have different types of intelligences, learning styles, paces, adn starting points, all students have special learning needs.”
Can we customize learning in factory-model schools?
How is Education organized (currently)

  • Organize students by age into grades, teach batches of material to batches of students
  • same subject, the same way, at the same pace
  • “Can the system of schooling designed to process groups of students in standardized ways in a monolithic instructional mode be adapted to handle differences in the way individual brains are wired for learning?”
  • Some schools try using Gardner’s “multiple intelligence”approach in their curriculum, but classrooms are too interdependent on the larger scale to customize learning.


Teachers can fall into intelligence “cliques” based on content areas. English/Language Arts (linguistic) verses Science (Inquiry, linear thinking). Students who match their teacher’s intelligence style will excel more.
Our schools are designed for standardization. If US is serious about NCLB, then we cannot teach students with the standardized model.
Solutions:
Customized learning in student-centric classrooms
Computer based learning (used properly) allows for modular systems of learning, therefore very customizable. Teachers can incorporate this technology into classrooms and students can learn about their own, unique learning style.

Chapter 2: Making the Shift:  Schools meet Society’s need
2. Explain the disruptive innovation theory.  What does this have to do with schools?
Disruptive innovation theory is when a low cost, simple product appears on the market and begins to become popular over time. (chapter 3: “To succeed, disruptive technologies must be applied in applications where the alternative is nothing.”) The new technology slowly grows amidst older, well established technologies, but at some point, overtakes the older technology.
I remember when compact disks showed up in music stores during the cassette hay-day. They occupied a small section of the store at best. In a few short years, cassettes were in that “small” section of the store and CD’s had taken over.
Then came MP3’s. this was a huge disruption in the music industry. As I like to think of it, mp3’s took away the Rock-and-Roll lifestyle artists enjoyed in the 80’s-90’s. “Money for nothing, and chicks for free” is how Dire Straits described this era. Once downloading digital music evolved, artists like Lars Ulrich began to tear up and clinch their wallets.
Back to schools, the disruption comes in the form of redefining the objectives of high schools. Throughout the 20th century, schools have continued to change with time. They offered very basic courses early in the century, and gradually diversified the content areas to better serve each new generation attending school. Schools began to offer college level classes (AP), music programs, vocational training, and other services to serve the expanding needs of each generation. Over the years, the role of school has taken on many jobs. Today, the four jobs schools serve are to preserve democracy, to provide something for every student, to keep the US competitive, and to eliminate poverty.
It was the redefining of the schools accountability of every students’ performance that disrupted the school systems, and they had to figure out how they could meet the expectations of NCLB within the existing structure of schools. Schools are now faced with the challenge of using computer based technology to offer a compartmentalized (customizable to each students’ needs) educational experience and to create student-centric classrooms.

Chapter 3: Crammed Classroom Computers
3.  Why doesn’t cramming computers in schools work?  Explain this in terms of the lessons from Rachmaninoff (what does it mean to compete against nonconsumption?)
Technology by itself is not a solution. Technology must be used appropriately to enhance student learning. In order to do this, computers must also be used in a strategic, structure manner created and directed by a teacher or administrator. The goal for computers in classrooms is to create a student-centric environment. The way computers are being used in classrooms today similarly mimic the traditional classroom experience. A computer program for an English literature class will have the same virtual activities found in the classroom, and not necessarily a new approach to learning the content. The computers should be customizing the lesson to fit each students learning style.
To compete against non-consumption is to introduce a technology that has no competitor. When the phonograph was invented by Thomas Edison, he revolutionized the way people listen to music. When RCA Victor started to produce the first phonographs, their target market were the people who could not go to see live musical performances, which was the only way to hear music prior to the phonograph. The phonograph did so well because it was sold to people who had no other means of hearing music. If the phonograph attempted to replace live music (the artist), it would be a relative disaster because it is not “better” than a human musician, and people who attend live musical performances expect to see a human being playing music, not a machine. This is the analogy used with Rachmaninoff, the musician who was recorded on one of the first phonographs. If RCA tried to sell concert tickets to see a phonograph “play” on stage, people would wank out. The phonograph stood no chance competing with a live musical performer, but it did great with people who could not attend live music.


Chapter 4: Disruptively Deploying Computers
4. Explain the pattern of disruption.
The disruptive technology is always initially competing against nothing. A new application of the computer can appear on the market (Rosetta Stone) to address a certain educational need. Rosetta stone is an example of technology used for learning languages, but it closely mirrors the learning methods found in classrooms. So Rosetta stone is competing with existing technologies, classroom based foreign language education. On the other hand, Schools may have trouble offering a diverse course-load because of limiting resources, such as classrooms, teachers, etc. If online classes could offer high school students an opportunity to take AP classes the traditional school setting cant offer, then we have an example of the first step in disruption, introducing a brand new way of learning.
Second, the technology will characteristically start of growing slow, until it becomes usefully “discovered” by the general public. Then, after slow growth and development, the popularity explodes exponentially. This reminds me of Facebook. I remember when it first started, and almost overnight, it became a ubiquitous household name.
Following the technologies explosion, the graph will level off to an asymptote, and the technology becomes established.
The key point here is that disruptive technologies don't grow linearly, but follow an exponential “S” curve. They begin slowly, not competing with any existing technology. Then they “explode” in popularity, and finally level off after becoming established within a system, like schools.

5. Explain the trap of monolithic instruction.  How does student-centric learning help this problem?
Here are some gaps that monolithic instruction can’t fill, and that student-centric, online learning experiences are filling today.
  • AP classes (some HS can’t offer them, size, funding, etc)
  • Small schools may not have “make-up” courses for students to retake to gtraduate on time
  • Home schooled students
  • HS dropouts
  • Students who cant conform to traditional school schedules (migrant working families)
  • Students needing special tutoring
  • Pre-kindergartners
Monolithic instruction tends to place specific teaching and learning styles with corresponding content areas. For example, students who communicate and learn easily through writing will do well in a traditional Language Arts classroom, and the teacher is more than likely to have the same learning style as the way he or she teaches. Monolithic instruction does not allow customized instruction to be delivered to each student, in his or her learning style or format. 


Chapter 5: The System for Student-Centric Learning
6. Explain public education’s commercial system.  What does it mean to say it is a value-chain business?  How does this affect student-centric learning?

Public Education’s Value Network:

  • All of the activities entailed in the decisions about what to teach and how to teach it.
  • Subject matter experts create textbooks and instructional tools
  • Textbooks/tools codify the content to be taught and the methods to teach it
  • Curriculum experts at state and local levels choose textbooks to adopt
  • Teachers then deliver content via means of chosen textbooks and resources
  • Teacher training sits between the tools and the students

Because textbooks are created and designed to instruct with the dominant intelligence of that content area, students sharing the same intelligence or learning style will learn better than someone who doesn't in that content area. The members of the panel who choose the textbooks tend to choose texts and instructional materials that are vest at teaching the material to the dominant intelligence of each field.

A value-adding process (VAP) is a business model. It is one of three dominant models and education falls under this one. A VAP business brings inputs of materials into one end of their premises, transforms them by asking value and deliver higher-valued products to their customers at the other end.
There are four steps in the VAP model for education:
  1. Producing and distributing textbooks and instructional materials
  2. Marketing and distribution
  3. Deliver content to students
  4. Individual assistance
Oceanside High School (iPad Technology) Visit, Physics & Chemistry
How was technology integrated into the curriculum? 
We visited two classrooms at OHS, Chemistry and Physics. First I went to observe iPads used in Chemistry class. When I entered the room, there were iPads tethered to each desk by a coiled-cable lock. They were black with clear protective cases. Along with the iPads, the classroom had two hanging projectors aimed at the white boards, each projecting their image onto a separate whiteboard. The projectors have the capability of viewing from the teachers classroom computer or iPad, any laptop, the students' iPads, and to an overhead docu-cam. There was a Wi-Fi antenna hanging from the ceiling providing wireless Internet access to all the iPads and PCs. Finally, the classroom was equipped with Apple TV tm which (I believe) allowed individual students to project their iPad screen onto the whiteboard via the projector. To summarize, each student has an iPad at their desk and wireless internet access in the classroom. The teacher also has an iPad, or laptop, and has control over the 2 projectors. Here are some of the things OHS is doing with their technology to improve student learning. 
First, assessments are made more authentic by giving each student a unique test or quiz by randomizing every question. Questions may be ordered by similar content, but the details can be randomized so each student solves a unique question. This is a great advantage to the teacher because when he or she calls on a student to explain the answer, the student will have to explain HOW they derived their answer, because just reciting the numbers from their problem wont correlate with other students' problems. This puts the emphasis on the procedure of solving the problem rather than memorizing "types" of problems. 
Do you feel that it promoted student learning?
I feel it did. Students were very savvy with the technology, and I think it aids in classroom assessments and logistics. Having projection capabilities for each student and instant assessment results allows for time to be used more efficiently in the classroom. 
Is there anything you saw that makes this classroom/school unique?
I learned that OHS allows for mastery of content by allowing students to take assessments over again until it is passed. I believe in this philosophy and was very pleased to see it being implemented. 


Video Reflection

8 comments:

  1. Matt-
    Your take on grades was interesting. I agree with you that some students would thrive and some would sink without them. I also want to include many types of assessments in my classroom. However, I don't necessarily think that "standardized" assessments necessarily ensures content competency--- aren't there just students out there that are good test takers? How do we ensure that our tests actually do measure our students' understanding of concepts? I also understand that tests (like the ones you listed) are a part of life so to not have them could be doing our students a disservice.

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  2. Matt, I agree with your observation that if a student shares the same learning method as the "dominant intelligence" of the content area, they will have a much easier time digesting the information. It makes me wonder how many of us who at birth had dramatically different learning styles from the majority adapted to survive in public education. Is it possible to change your learning style through conditioning?

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  3. Hello Matt,
    Your consideration of who the non-consumers are was something I enjoyed reading. You address the issue of the gaps in "traditional" education well, so I would have liked to hear more of your theories on how tech can close these up. So I also examined your take on the visit to OUSD and appreciated your perspective. (Go Jack and Wilma!)

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  4. I really liked your analogy of the Rosetta stone program. Although there may have been some minor applications dealing with language instruction I believe that that product was the first dedicated "disruptive product" due to its complete immersion style of teaching.

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  5. Your ideas on the use of monolithic teaching in the classroom is really interesting. I feel that a lot of teachers fail to realize that they excuse monolithic teaching with their content area. Another interesting thing is that these do not stick to any certain content area. You hear this from Math teachers, which you may expect, but you also hear this from other teachers that want to excuse their ineffective teaching.

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  6. I wonder if the real question is not about grades but about summative assessment, since it seems that the only thing we do with the results of the summative assessment is to assign a grade.
    Your point about a minimum level of competency is also interesting to me. If that is what we're after, then I think well-designed and thorough formative assessment would actually be better and no grades would be required. I have participated in educational situations where the course was not complete until everybody enrolled reached the minimum competency, and it worked. But there are problems with abandoning summative assessment - for one, how do you then recognize and acknowledge the achievement of those who exhibit the exceptional competence and creativity? I think I'm going to have to do some serious thinking about assessment in general. Perhaps a blog post or two.

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  7. Matt, I really like all of the video sources you have used over the semester. I fully intend on stealing as many of them as possible for my classes. Thanks again.

    -Carl

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    1. Very happy to hear you are enjoying these links. I love discovering new ideas and sharing them as well :)

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