Stikkit to Lesson Plans

(And my apologies to Stikkit for the lousy title).

I'm as interested as the next teacher who likes the technology stuff to get organized. Lesson planning is no exception.

Most of us began our scripting of beautiful lesson plans with those really nice spiral-bound Lesson Plan books that even gave us some overview of the basics of a lesson plan and perhaps, a refresher of Bloom's taxonomy. And so, each year, I would faithful chart out my beginning days of the trimester during the beginning of the year meetings and feel good that I had "planned out" or "organized" my classes. I had a plan and I had a book to keep those plans in.

Then, like many other types of organizers, I would miss a day and then a week. I would scratch down an outline of the day in my composition book or on a sticky note only to neglect my faithful Lesson Plan Book.

Enter the power (and distraction) of the computer and the internet and now we're faced with countless possibilities in managing the shape of how our classes will look, feel, act, and move. Many mimic the paper version of the Lesson Planner Book that we grew up with; others will add lots of Standards-based features. In the end, I really could not take any of those programs seriously.

Most of last year, I used Dave Winer's OPML editor. In a sense, I used the outlining feature because it was simple, fast and very flexible. It was fairly transferable to other programs and was very easy to create sub plans. I really liked that there were both a Mac and a Windows version of the program so that I could work from home and at school on my plans.

But because of some glitch with my computer, I really couldn't use the OPML editor this school year. So, I went back to the paper Lesson Planner Book, but still longed for an easier way to keep track of my day-to-day plans (for I would sometimes forget to update the plans in the book). I found myself writing daily plans on sticky notes.

Because I've listen to Merlin Mann on other podcasts, I checked out Stikkits awhile ago and then didn't see the value for yet another sticky note metaphor. A week ago, when trying to decide to organize my student publication class, I returned to Stikkit and decided to take it for a spin in organizing my stuff through a favorite metaphor (who doesn't love the sticky note? Sort of a twitter on a piece of paper).

And though I went with a wiki for organizing my student publications class, I found that Stikkit is really smart and cool and easy to use.I won't take much time explaining how to use the site as I would encourage to start playing around and look at the online help; create some Stikkits and see what happens to those notes.

I like Stikkits for lesson planning because it does remain flexible and "thinks" through some of my items and cross references certain items to todo things or time-sensitive stuff. I have an overall shape for my classes (the big picture) along with the pacing of the weeks (what I want to accomplish). Lesson plans, as I see it, are the outline to carry out that shape or intent of the day--it's a set list that you may have for a gig; it's the songs with a few transitions and key changes and perhaps a few words to help move the performance along. For me, it's not necessary to mark down all of the details (that seems to come in other documents); for me, the plan is enough information that I or someone (such as a sub) could work their way through the class. (If I've done my job right, students already have an idea of the pacing of my class).

So I've using Stikkits for that past few days and I think I've found my lesson planner. From this example, I list my classes and use the todo key term (-) to indicate something to check off. The rest of the example is enough information, in an outline form, to help prompt me through my classes. Some feature that I really like are the tagging feature (which, for right now, I just put at the bottom) and the Discussion tab, which I use for my own reflection on the day or ways that I could use Stikkits more effectively.

My only misgiving with the program as a lesson planner is printing: it's not very clean and there's extra stuff (the side bar, for example) that shows up on the printed page. The only really reason why I need to print out my lesson is in case I need a substitute teacher. In that case, I plan on doing a copy/paste into a word processor for formating prettiness (and clarity for the sub). (Update: I'm ill today and I tried this, and it works great: I just copied from Flock [a Firefox-based browser] and pasted into a new OpenOffice doc and the result was very pretty: all formating transfered as it should).

One of my favorite things about Stikkits is that I find out how dang simple it is and yet how that simplicity can be very powerful; I learn something new almost everyday. I could see how I really don't need GoogleNotebook nor GoogleCalendar because through the strong sticky note metaphor, I can keep all my notes in one place. And, if you've done some GTD stuff or training, then you will find how Stikkits fit right well in managing tasks.

I'll give up an update in a week to let know you know what I've learned (and, if I've kept up with Stikkits).

Entrenched Engagement

Dale Dougherty ,writing for O'Reilly, tries to tease out some of the questions in how today's technology can affect what is happening in the classroom:

Is it possible for education to be transformed by Web 2.0 thinking, if not Web 2.0 technology? How could it disrupt the entrenched educational bureaucracy and offer new, potentially better, ways for self-directed learning and exploration? Can we break down the walls of the classroom to make it possible for students and teachers to re-connect in more meaningful ways? Education@Web 2.0

I think he is asking the questions that are on the minds of folks in the technology world and who are wondering when are the teachers and schools are going to start openly adopting some of these technologies (such as Web 2.0 apps and movements: Facebook and social networking to name a few). I don't want to read into his words too much, but the tension between technology creators and classroom educators (the rhyme wasn't intentional) has existed for some time and Todd Oppenheimer has outlined a bit of that relationship in The Computer Delusion. I won't try and recreate what Oppenheimer has already done, but I would like to qualify a statement about the "entrenched educational bureaucracy" that Dougherty refers to.

He's right: it is entrenched and it is a bureaucracy. Public education deserves all of the criticism it receives for not serving everyone equally and for not preparing every person for life. Public education is failing and public education is not easily fixed. If you want a guarantee that a student will be completely safe and will be completely prepared academically, do not send your child to a public school...it's too risky.

But, before you send your child to a private or charter school or perhaps homeschool your child, recognize that public schools, like democracy, have not been a reality, but a goal. Public schools, like our version of democracy, is a part of the grand experiment (which I'm sure has been said elsewhere and so I apologize for relying on rhetoric).

Rather than scrapping the whole thing and "overhauling" the educational system (that, btw, is political rhetoric used in the pushing through of No Child Left Behind and probably most of the current 2008 Presidential candidates' stump speeches), maybe we need to shift the power back toward the educators. As I see it, we've been in the age of describing school in business-like terms: community members are now shareholders, concern is now accountability and the students are lost in the endless charts and graphs that litter up most DOE websites. Businesses are in the game to make money for their shareholders...that's what businesses do. It should be a conflict of interest to have business people making up the majority of educational committees (and such is the case for at least the state of Indiana's "Indiana Plan for Digital-Age Learning " committee and the Educational Roundtable).

Instead, return education back to the classroom educators (having college representatives or school superintendents do not count here) and work more with the teachers-teaching-teachers model that I've made reference to in another post (much like the National Writing Project model).

For those who want a more radical way of rethinking education, why not take the best of the social aspects of democracy and apply a non-capitalistic model to it: yes, why not an open source education? I know it's not a new idea and it is running on the heals of big tech buzz words, but it may be an idea worth pursuing. A good start would to look over Douglas Rushkoff's Open Source Democracy and see the thinking that can occur when we strip off coercion and established structures and use the potential of a technology such as the internet for good and not marketing.

But that revolution probably won't happen nationally yet; but, perhaps the ideas from that discussion could affect one classroom and then another and then a conference...

Back to the Dougherty post: a cool thing happens when you say something in a blog post: people comment and discuss and critique and qualify and, well, work with ideas. Already, his post has generated discussion on his site and has been the spark for this post. Our students are doing the same thing on things that they care about on other sites.

Quo Vadimus?

(Quo vadimus? or Where are we going?)

My main attitude toward using technology in the classroom is a not so much a mixed-blessing, but sometimes a necessary evil--something that once we desired, that now we're really not sure of. In the past 10 years, "Educational Software" sales have boomed--from the electronic worksheet stacks to the cooler effects (based on the latest version of Flash). Some companies even include documentation which indicates which activities with their software fits which State or National educational Standards--as if it were an afterthought (but perhaps good marketing).

So, does technology make or students smarter, preparing them for the 21st century workplace therefore being productive members of society?

Wrong question because it has been asked or used as a reason for spending lots of bucks and making long-term business decisions with hardware and software companies and those decisions haven't actually come from the teachers or parents--with the exception for the business people who think that technology will fix education--I mean, the shareholders of the community.

With the fuss of the last 10 years of technology in the classroom, little has been highlighted by how technology helps with learning--sure, there are those articles that deductively claim that by using this product that students can retain more...but it is usually not spelled out "more than what..."

(originally posted on www.vergil66.com/bashinged: 12 Jan 07)

Don't date Technology or Why you shouldn’t replace your current practice with the new stuff

(a conversation about how pedagogy intersects with technology and why you should avoid computers in the classroom).
Dating Advice
The more I teach, the more I am concerned with my students' choices in life and the one that seems to get in their way is that special time called dating. I'm not trying to rain on their happiness, but I stoically remind them that this time (high school) should more of a time of building relationships (conversations) with the opposite gender and less time "hooking up" with someone.

So, here's the script: usually toward the beginning of a grading period, I have "the talk" with my new students. If I happen to have a student that has taken a class before, the conversation is sometimes prompted by those students: "Mr. Judson, when are you going to tell the class about your advice on dating?" Slight shock and perhaps a giggle later and I begin:

"Here's my advice on dating..." (dramatic pause and perhaps I scan the class)..."My advice on dating in high school (pause) is (pause) don't" and again, I scan and look for the person who has the "What a Moron" scowl on their face.

"Not a good idea, you know, and I will never tell you, for those of you who ignore my advice, that when he or she does dump you, and dump you hard, and you say to me 'Mr. Judson, I should have listened to you' I will not say 'I told you so.'"

And the class smiles, but I know what they are thinking:

"I know what you are thinking: 'Mr. Judson didn't get any dates in high school' and to that I can say that I dated...a little...and besides it was a long distance relationship...anyway, more importantly: I ran around with a big group of people, guys and girls, and we spent a lot of our time having fun, talking, and just being a group of friends."

I scan the classroom again.

"I know, now some of you think that Mr. Judson thinks his way is the best way and to that I could say: sure. You will be spending the rest of your trying to communicate with the opposite gender, why lose out on time to do that in high school. High school is about friendships and memories and why blow it on hoping you can keep stringing the guy or girl along until after prom?"

"Now, I know that some of you have it in you that you simply must date. You are currently in a relationship or you are always in a relationship, or you really think that being in a relationship is the key to living. So, for you folk, I do have an amendment to the imperative (that means a command). If you feel that you must date, then make sure that that person (pause) reads books" (wait for the laugh line or for the girl who mutters 'well, I'm in trouble'). "Here's the thinking: It's Friday night and it's 30 minutes before curfew and you are parked in a dark and secluded place and the windows are fogged up: if you want to be doing something worthwhile, you should be talking about books."

The story is not meant to be a way to talk to your students about dating or meant to be contrary to everyone who married their high school sweetheart; it is meant to provide the major overarching metaphor for my assessment of the relationship between teaching (pedagogy) and technology (in our case: something related to the digital frontier: personal computers, the internet, the Web 2.0 and even Moodle (a combination of php, html and a database)).

From my experience and reading I've come to the conclusion that my advice to teachers and their desire to use these technologies in their classrooms is constant with my dating advice: Don't. The promises and the newness will yield more frustration than told to you and in all the while you miss out on working on what really counts: books...no, kind of, no the stuff of teaching: pedagogy. I will try to talk you out of using Moodle (or other computer-based technologies) only because it, like other technologies through the ages, can never replace an intelligent, caring educator who works the craft of the science and art, the humanness of teaching. But, if you really think you have to enter into this relationship with technology, then at least know why you want to and what this new relationship (or old) will do or can do in your teaching.

Don't get me wrong, I love technology and I fiddle constantly with the newer stuff that's floating around. I had my first class website (which I built with Claris Homepage in 1997 and later modified with Inspiration's html capabilities in 1999) and starting adding newer interactivity (using Blogger and then iBlog with tagboard and Quicktopic...I also tried using Freeway for one class, but gave up on the old model of interneting) until I came upon Moodle 2 years ago. But it that process, I've had to come to terms with that relationship. Some of the times, it has been wonderful and has fulfilled my vision of a classroom I'd like to be in; but many times, it's been a struggle and has caused more frustration than I have ever experienced in trying to get a copier machine to copy onto an overhead transparency. Many times, I've wanted to scrap the whole thing and tell everyone else to do the same. But, as in many relationships, we get wiser and better at communication and I think that in the relationship with technology and education, we need to turn from the capitalistic/political version of education and remember what the big rocks are in our pedagogy.

(orginally posted at www.vergil66.com/bashinged on 07 April 5)

Technology on Mission

When starting a business or a new venture, the common practice calls for interested and invested parties to articulate what will happen in the business. In days of old, one might have an idea, sketch out an outline, and then start doing the business. Today, though, we've come a long ways: today, we subject all parties to scripting inspiration for decades to come. I'm referring to, of course, the dreaded mission statement.

My first taste of carving my person mission statement into the tree of time was through Covey training at the current school that I'm employed. The 7 Habits for Highly Effective People permeated all business and many educational institutions (I've lost track of which metaphor we're one now...I lost interest around the Fish! and the Whales motif). I had done the DayTimer thing (along with many others) and found that I liked some of the stuff Covey had to offer (especially the idea that you arrange your time around relationships, not appointments). But, and those of you that still have your Covey Planner somewhere, the first step is: Begin with the End in Mind(tm). And we got to spend some time molding a mission statement that reflected our lives and values, dreams and desires, hopes and ... well, you get the idea.

I can't remember mine now, and in a way, the process became really tedious. And I remember looking around during our training and then I couldn't help remember the part in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy where the ship filled with middle-management people can't get anything done because, though they had successfully held regularly scheduled meetings, they hadn't even invented fire.

Sometimes the process of business is absurd. And I think a good place to start is to rip down those silly mission statements. Especially ones that have anything to do with technology.

For example, let's take a look at what gets emphasized in the cover letter of the Indiana Plan for Digital-Age Learning. (BTW, it had three addressees: the governor, the state superintendent, and "Fellow Indiana Education Stakeholders"). After some introductory remarks, we get the mission statement in the second graf:

“Indiana’s K-12 schools, under the guidance of excellent teachers, to engage in self-directed, lifelong Digital-Age learning -- as individuals, in learning communities, and with their families-- as they strive for rigorous academic excellence in today’s high-tech, global society.”

Now, to be fair, they are calling this the "vision"...still, it's a fairly typical mission statement that reminds me of what would score high on the writing portion of the state writing section.
And, it lacks any passion that education can (and should) inspire in individuals. Let's break it down and see what is lurking (or missing) from the words.

Indiana's K-12 schools
What is missing here is the whole K-16 movement. The colleges are not a part of this plan and probably shouldn't be.

under the guidance of excellent teachers
This seems suspect to me. The plan will call for teachers to mentor other teachers in technology. I have a feeling this is what Jan Weir is currently doing and I have a feeling that this committee is using her work as a model of how best to teach teachers: with teachers. This staff development model (National Writing Project is based on it) is a sound one, but often overlooked when glossy brochures will show how your school can get higher test scores with little or no additional work. I'll probably come back to this phrase, but my gut feeling tells me that it will be hardest one to implement. Instead, having someone come in and do Professional Development on technology is much easier. I also don't believe the word "guidance"; I can't imagine that classroom teachers will be given the reigns to guide the program

to engage in self-directed
This is the promise of current trends in education: to make kids independent and to direct their learning. Sounds good, but there's little out there to engage students that much (with a state curriculum to get through?) Most teachers are not trained in this type of learning and it's probably not the best way for all students.

lifelong Digital-Age learning
Wow! If this isn't a buzzword ready to take flight. The "lifelong" part is from the days of interviewing for a teaching job and our "philosophy of education." Everyone says that they want to encourage "lifelong" learning...perhaps it is the goal of education. Again, if it really happens is a completely different story and there are too many factors to measure this part of the vision. You probably had at least one teacher that you connected with and inspired you to do...something. The problem is, not all teachers connect with all students and that's probably because we are all human and slightly self-centered and it might have something to do with the idea that we are not all Lego pieces. "Digital-Age learning" is the weight of the document, and I will have to come back to this one later. In short: it's trying to align with the 21st Century Skills and it's an educational buzzword that perhaps had meaning once, but now is void (which means it will enter into the political jargon just in time for elections). [In doing more checking, there's little on the 21st Century Skills site for this term. My guess is since it was referred to at the Milken site, it may be a word that Cheryl Lemke of the Metiri Group uses in writing state technology plans].

-- as individuals, in learning communities, and with their families--
This is a qualifying section, as is true with many visionmission statements. This, again, emphasizes current trends within education: the individual work, the group work and the connection with families. Group work is probably over-emphasized in educational circles. There is little reason why we do "group work" besides helping kids work with one another because "that's how it's done in the real world." My instinct (and my non-educational work experience) tells me that I should concentrate on what I do rather than what my groups is (or should be) doing. The family part seems to be out of place and is probably there to pull in all "shareholders."

as they strive for rigorous academic excellence in today’s high-tech, global society.
Lots of stuff going on here, but it is really the goal of this educational plan: to be competitive with the world market. Eduspeak such as "rigorous" and "excellence" are very common today and reflect the continuing thought that schools are not doing their jobs and just need to work harder at learning the kids more so that the next generation can win the game.

And what is missing from this visionmission statement? We're talking about technology and we're talking about education and this has absolutely no passion in the words. None. Even if we are discussing a purpose that I don't concur with, there's nothing to wrap our imagination around. (You want passion in business literature? Try reading Tom Peter's blog or Re-Imagine! and not get excited, mad, angry or wowed).

Instead, the business model, in very business-like form of a visionmission statement, removes from education the one thing that all of us remember: someone or something that inspired us to do something beyond us.

Twitter as a model of learning

For those who don't know about Twitter, lots of stuff has been written about the Web 2.0 app that asks the question "What are you doing?" The cool thing is that you get a max. of 140 characters for each response or "tweet." Most school networks block access to the site because it is considered a "social networking" site and apparently those sites are put on the same tier as pornography and hate sites: they are blacklisted via school/corporation/or state filters. But, like most students, everyone does their thing on the web when they get home and twittering for me has been very freeing and lately, I've been thinking about how it reflects how we think...

Remember making an outline in your high school English class before writing your paper? I'm not down with that practice; many people I know will jot an outline before writing an essay or giving a speech. But to think that an outline is a great prewriting strategy is probably not true for all people. Many people don't think in outlines; many people, from my experience, think in bursts. The notion that thinking about a topic or idea should be represented only by an outline, a bulleted list, a complete sentence/paragraph doesn't seem that accurate. Unfortunately, this thought came to me during a slightly uninteresting talk being given recently (and isn't that when the brain seems to come up with really cool stuff: when we're bored?)

I'm siting in a presentation where the person talking was not prepared and was not keeping to the topic at hand and I couldn't take it anymore...so I pulled out my compostion book (they were on sale at Target for 33 cents and I grabbed a few). I've been using my compositon book as my main writing place (or inbox, for you GTD fans). I bring it with me everywhere just in case I have to simply entertain my mind-- before I have to hurt someone. Or, less violently, to jot down notes to myself, write, make lists, take notes, write, script lesson plans...

So I'm complaining, you see, in my composition book about the setting and the topic and the speaker and then, perhaps, I try to be really creative, and I try to write something profound (and in this case, I was making comment about how I see an audience member's "tensing jaw--sometimes relaxing-- all the time keeping the smile"...which I found amusing...the words that is). On the next page, I make a connection with the content of my masters exit project (about Aliteracy: the idea that people have the ability to read, but don't read) and then, my thoughts go to some planning for next trimester for a project that I want to try with a senior writing class. I jump back to something that the speaker who has said something that made me write "What the hell does that really mean?" I give a couple more questions and then end with a completely other thought.

And during this time (in what some people might call journaling or free-form notes or responses) I write this:

Oh, to be able to Twitter right now--it is interesting that Twitter might be closer to reflecting/learning--short burts--than other ways or metaphors.

Some don't like Twitter because it's too many conversations going on at the same time. But, perhaps, that's how learning and talking and living happen: Observation and observation and some reflection and then a short burst of insight based on those observations and reflections. Maybe we try and hold too dearly to the ladder of learning that we call "Bloom's Taxonomy." Maybe it's not that linear and steppy; maybe, it's a little more like an ellipsis...

Close read of the Indiana Plan (Preface)

Tonight, to make true to my promise after skimming the plan and writing about it and then making a few comments about businesses teaching education, I'm finding that most of my gut impressions were true...I'm just seeing the detail of how much economics has to play in this plan. It is, in a sense, about keeping up with other states and countries and is based on a national movement called 21st Century Skills (which I remember being concerned about in my first skim). If the 21st Century Skills gets more steam, this will probably be the next education reform to replace No Child Left Behind (now, it will be No Business Left Behind...sorry, it was really too easy to pass up).

I spent time working through the Introduction and the Executive Summary and I'll post more later. In short, fear is the motivator and the proof of the claims are up for debate. In general: the evidence and research is much like most policy documents: an insistence on direct correlations and relationships. It is almost as if claims are treated as common sense or obvious because some business group did a study and that means that those conclusions are true. (And yes, I have read Freakonomics and Blink lately along with the dictionary and teaching argumentation and rhetoric to AP students.)

And while I am at it, I should also mention that I have been twittering since Feb 2007, I have a Facebook page, been using a website for my classes for 10 years, learning Latin though an online community, play bass and I think an inuksuk is pretty profound. In short, I find the report out-of-touch with the real digital age of students and locked into the bureacracy of policy and capitalism. Education and learning to be a productive member of a democracy is not the goal of this report; education for securing the top spot for The Democracy is.

As a side note, I do not doubt the hard work of these people; they did their jobs very well. The issue, though, is that this is not an innovative educational document; this plan is for economic recovery.

Business educates schools

I'm taking a look at my original post regarding the current technology plan for Indiana and I'm rereading the original ,pdf report. I'm beginning first of all with the occasion of the report and it looks like much of the Indiana plan comes from an organization called Partnership for 21st Century Skills (and guess how many of these educational/business leaders actually spent any time in the school, let alone as a classroom teacher? Hint: somewhere close to nil).

On the Partnership site, I came across a video "Transforming Education for the 21st Century" produced by BizWise TV (here's the YouTube version) with a business spin on the world of education with all of the usually whippings of the current educational system (with its generalizations sprinkled with some businesse--even a "paradigm" thrown in). No real numbers are used in their proof of why the American educational system is so bad. Oh wait, at 11:33 into the video, Keith Kruger (CEO for the non-profit Cons. for School Networking) is giving real numbers based on a study initiated by...oh, Cisco Systems (the producers of this little business webcast).

Now, back to this study (which comes on the heels of the line: a lot of money spent on technology without a lot of impact): Cisco funds the study to review the literature of the past 10 years and came to the following two conclusions:

Technology advocates overpromised the effects of technology in the classroom and, you'll notice the operative word "can",

Technology when carefully put into place, "can have a transformative impact" on education.

The rest of the video continues the same pseudo-news approach to education (there's even a panel discussion toward the end of the business-ad-webcast). What you will not find in this video is anyone really asking questions that can't be answered. I think businesses are meant to feel smug after watching this video because they have the answer to solving the public school "crisis" (and, with all charity, you know). These people have never taught in a real classroom and yet, in their American Business Experience (like a knight in shining armor), they have the answer (and btw, they also have the products for your school to accomplish their-oops- the goals).

So, back to the 21st Century Skill folk, there are some reps from the educational community: university people. Nothing again our friends in higher education, but that still doesn't make you an expert in what happens in the K-12 classroom.

"Indiana Plan for Digital-Age Learning” fails on logic and pedagogy

As sometimes I do when I have extra time on a Spring Break where it is snowing outside, I cruise on over to the Indiana DOE site to see what is "coming down the pipe" from Indianapolis. I know that 7 Habits encourages us to not concentrate on the Circle of Concern that is not within our Circle of Influence, but I still think what I say about an educational matter still has merit.

So today found me looking at the "Indiana Plan for Digital-Age Learning" (Jan 2007) publication and apparently final report. I know that I read it looking for the key words that gets me a bit keyed up (heck, I've begun a separate blog just for technology and education), but here are some things that will still be there when I go back and do a closer read (and my apologies to twitter readers for my ranting):

The makeup of the committee that brings the recommendation are truly shareholders in education: they are mostly business owners or administrators in the technology field. The only "educators" are either school IT people or school administrators. The only active teacher is Jan Weir, a high school chemistry teacher. My bet, and I pick this up from the report, that most of the data to support their recommendations came from other sources rather than real knowledge within the classroom.

The "proof" data itself is based upon projections and even if you didn't like it, the book Freakanomics should be a lesson for us that those who try and forecast trends and especially educational ones are merely just giving a guess and not prophecy. You know this because there is little "here's the other side of the story" discussion. About the only concession you'll get on reports such as these are the obligatory "technology alone is not the magic bullet" and "technology is a tool" comments. But the rest of the report will sing the glories of the report's conclusions.

Speaking of "proof" you always need an "edge" in scaring those who might disagree with your recommendations, and in Indiana it is "the brain drain." All of our brightest kids are leaving the states to go elsewhere. Don't you think that it might have something to do with the weather in Indiana (hey, it's snowing today...and it's Spring Break!) Bring in the woes of the economy and then use it as proof that you as taxpayers need to spend more money on computers. This is a logical fallacies because nowhere in the report does it give proof that if we spend more time and money on computers and this approach to how we do school will our kids be "more competitive" in the workplace (and btw, what about actually learning?)

My favorite part is the survey of teachers, because they come across as, well, a bit technologically dumb in the results (represented by handy Excel-generated bar graphs). And this is my favorite because it's the most true: teachers are cautious because each 7 years, someone says that that "THIS IS THE BEST WAY TO DO SCHOOL" and teachers are human and pretty smart and will know that if it is as promised, there will be proof. For technology in the classroom (all the new whiteboards and snazzy software to make Johnny finally appear to be reading because of the report at the end of the session) the proof is not there.

So, all of this on a quick read. I fully admit my lack of close read and will do that later. My gut feeling is that my instincts are right: people love the new stuff and want a magic bullet, but rarely want to talk in depth about the relationship to pedagogy. Education as a whole has been the whipping boy of public discourse and politics for too long (you realize that the "Nation at Risk" document in 1983 is responsible for most of this and, surprise, may based on faulty data and conclusion).

Sure, we do things differently now than we did when I was in high school (1984); so, as we try and infuse some of these ways of communication into our classrooms, ask a teacher first...and pull up a chair and take note, because it'll take awhile to see how solid pedagogy directs technology's usage.