Staff Training

Just spent tonight putting the finishing touches on two goes at 15 minutes of fame at the Web 2.0 Showcase at TSOF tomorrow afternoon. I've got my links ready on my personal wiki and yesterday I had the brainwave of putting together a StartPage for the event that could showcase a variety of the presenters' web ventures to show how easy it is have fed into one spot. The result - the Web2Showcase PageFlakes page, made public for your viewing pleasure. The idea is that after my initial splurge on wikis, I'll use the free wireless at TSOF to add any referenced resources to the page to show at the end of my StartPages session. I've got vonnie's del.cio.us feeding in, Mike Seyfang's youtube masterpieces, blogs from all the presenters and a section showing some of the less serious flakes developed by the PageFlakes community - i.e. a daily George Bush quote, an ESPN feed and my own del.icio.us tagcloud.

Fingers crossed.

My sinuses have been playing up, and I'm currently suffering the worst hayfever since the early nineties. Back then, I was teaching in Port Augusta, gateway to the Outback and from late winter the dry northerlies would bring down the red dust from the direction of Woomera and beyond. Moving back to Adelaide and a milder (and less dust laden) climate has seen things settle down in my nasal regions over the past decade but the record dry here in South Australia has my nose, eyes and throat in a time warp.

So, I'm wondering if the cooler New Zealand weather would be kinder to my current state of health. Kicking back with the likes of Leigh, Alex, Stephen, Jo Kay and even Artichoke at the amazing The Future of Learning in a Networked World travelling open space conference would be pretty good. In my conversation with Alex the other evening, he described the whole event as "lo-fi" - in a good way. If I could somehow put my current life on pause, then this would be a great event to attend. The line up of thinkers and e-learning experts in tow is phenomenal - just check out the list on the right hand side of the official blog. Leigh Blackall is the mastermind behind this "unconference roadshow" and it is a masterful example of social networking and flat collaboration. For 10 days across a range of venues over the Shaky Isles, taking in the eFest in Wellington as well and talking e-learning with all and sundry at the various visits and events along the way. Even Artichoke who is not associated all that much with TALO (not that I'm all that active there either) signed on the other day. So my challenge is to participate virtually, reading the blog, checking out the wiki, sign up for the The Future of Learning in a Networked World Google Group and check out the Flickr feed. Not quite as good as being there but I'm not missing out totally.

Then there's the Global Summit coming up in October. That looks awesome but at A$795 a head plus airfare plus accommodation to get to Sydney and stay (not including my release from my work for that time) it's beyond my reach unless someone from educationau reads this blog, takes pity on me and offers sponsorship in exchange for massive live blogging of the event. Never mind, Al Upton will be there (I think) and I hope he gets to go to Leigh Blackall's session there and say "G'day" for me.

But there is a great conference available at a price that suits me and won't cause any ripples to my family life routine - the K-12 Online Conference. I still have to read more thoroughly about how it's all going to work and it has received a fair bit of publicity around the edublogosphere. On Sunday afternoon, I checked my home desktop for e-mail and saw that Wesley Fryer had shared his Skype details with me and was online at the time, 11.40 pm his time. (Don't you just love my blogger name dropping!) I had to say "G'day" and after a quick exchange of pleasantries, Wesley asked if I had considered submitting something for the K-12. I had never even considered that I'd submit anything but as Wes is in charge of the Overcoming Obstacles strand, he got me thinking that maybe I should give some thought to participating in this way. The deadline is Sept. 30 so if I make sure that I attend to my own local school priorities, it could be a goer. Anyway, it promises to be really good with keynote podcasts, online resources and heaps of great learning. And while on the topic of Wes, I appreciated his pointer to a great resource for use in the primary school classroom, Mission Possible: Successful Online Research - an online video produced by answers.com. I used it this afternoon with my class on the ACTIVboard after our Go-Go golf session was rained on (ironic, considering how I started this post) and the kids were engaged and pulled some good pointers from it. Even though, someone muttered under their breath towards the end that they thought it was an extended infomercial for answers.com!! At least it's something educationally useful being plugged - a resource that helps kids to gain and sort through the information overload of the web is a resource that teachers should become familiar with. Hope there's more in the information literacy vein at the K-12 Online Conference. See you there.
k12.jpg

It's always dangerous adding another blog to the aggregator, another conversation to follow but when I find one that speaks to me on topics that I relate to, in it goes. My latest addition comes from the Bump On The Blog where Brian Grenier is saying a lot of things that describe my role pretty closely.

What’s been concerning me more though is how I can get teachers to understand exactly what my job is and get them to act upon some of my suggestions. Let me try to clarify the predicament I am speaking of. If I had to sum up my job in one sentence (which I do quite often), it would be this; I assist/train teachers with integrating technology into their curriculum with the ultimate goal of improving student achievement. That said, what I have come to notice is that teachers are calling upon me NOT to help them integrate technology, but rather to fix some technical problem (printers, network access, setting up computers, etc…) I’m not quite sure how to address this situation, being that I really don't feel I am in a position to tell teachers what they should be doing in their classroom. I really don’t mind troubleshooting and solving problems for teachers, but I fear that by doing this too often I am neglecting to do what I really should, and want, to be doing. I’ve tried taking the opportunity in the past to talk to teachers about technology integration as I was in the process of fixing some technical problem, but it doesn’t seem to sink in. I usually get comments like “That’s a great idea” or “Hmmm, I never thought about doing it that way. I leave thinking that maybe this teacher will actually try implementing some of my ideas, ask me to work with them one on one to get a better grasp on strategies, or share the idea with some of their colleagues who would show some interest. I’m disappointed when the next time they approach me is not to talk about these ideas, but to fix some new technical problem. I’d really like to hear some comments about ways you would suggest, or have approached, such situations.

Brian's dilemma is one I share and it's not an easy thing to resolve. In my role, I help to set stuff up so that the technology is focussed on the learning and that requires some technical thought and basic expertise. But my role statement is about improving teaching and learning, and it is easy for that role to play second fiddle to trouble shooting. The bottom line is also that if the technology doesn't work, then the risk is that teachers won't bother. My difficulty is finding the time to find that balance between working on improving teachers' ICT use and resolving technical problems that help them get back on track quickly. For example, at the moment I have a teacher who has calibration issues with the ACTIVboard in the classroom, a laptop out of action for another teacher who needs it for her ACTIVboard and another request for a classroom computer to have the local printer installed.

Sometimes the two parts meld together. Another teacher wants to use the new scanner in the MYLU block. In this case, the technical aspect is to install the software for the teacher, show her how to hook it up to her laptop - but the teaching and learning payoff comes because my actions then enable her to implement her own teaching and learning agenda. But in the scheme of things, using an ICT coordinator hired to influence teaching and learning is an expensive way to solve technical issues.

So, my way around this is try and lead by example, pushing new ideas out to the staff members who seem most receptive and keeping the conversation ticking over in the staffroom. Look for opportunities to offer leads and tips to others - with our new IWB users, a new website for resources or cool new application can be what helps them to maintain enthusiasm and keep working towards the seamless integration of ICT in their classroom. I also don't want to be seen as the "expert" (although in some ways, that's unavoidable) because that can backfire as methods or ideas I propose can be seen as requiring too much technology based expertise for a busy, regular classroom teacher. So, my role is always a state of constant re-invention, a work in progress - in the end, I don't think I have much insight to offer Brian.

Just a deep sense of empathy.

Just a quick advertisement for a free event for Adelaide based teachers called the Web2 Showcase. Blurb from the TSOF website as follows:

Web2 Showcase: All you wanted to know but were too afraid to ask! Thursday September 21st, 2006, 4.15 – 6.30 pm, Discovery Centre, TSoF Guest presenters: Graham Wegner, Al Upton, Mike Seyfang, and Yvonne Murtagh This is a free event An introduction to some of the collaborative Web2 resources that are quick, easy, intuitive, free, personal, collaborative, connected and empowering for kids and teachers.

It's going to be in the vein of Darren Kuropatwa's Whiplash! concept where each new tool set gets a fifteen minute overview before it switches to the next presenter. I'm going to do two sections - one on wikis and the other on Personal StartPages and it is pretty amazing to be part of a group of such high calibre educators involved in working out how these new tools can play a part in our classrooms.

I've been enjoying the holiday break and spending some quality time with the family. I went to Teachers Golf Day on the Monday at the wonderful Murray Bridge Golf Club. I was my usual inconsistent self mixing in two birdies with some atrocious holes including sailing a long tee shot over the out-of-bounds fence onto someone's gravel driveway. On Tuesday we took the boys to see Over The Hedge at the cinema. I still marvel at the amazing animation in children's films these days especially after we saw Cars the other week as well. The first ten minutes of that movie were a sensory spectacular - I loved the realistic shine and gleam on the animated cars as they jockeyed for position on the precisely detailed track, putting even an X-Box 360 to shame. I still have to consciously remind myself that the "wow" factor I experience isn't necessarily the same for my sons - in fact, because it is so "real" I wonder if the blurred distinction between the real world and animated world is impossible to detect in their malleable minds. Certainly, in my youth, cartoons like The Roadrunner Show and Huckleberry Hound didn't have that problem.

Every evening though, I fire up the laptop and spend some time tweaking and preparing for my blogging workshop at the upcoming CEGSA conference. Now North Americans might all head to NECC but in this part of the world, this conference is a big deal. So,I've been fussing over a Powerpoint slideshow that will serve as a backdrop/brain prompt/presentation tool and trying to observe some of the ideas and philosophies I've read over at Presentation Zen. I'm trying to keep text to short memorable phrases (Be a contributor, not just a consumer) and a simple colour scheme in line with the "less is more" approach. I went hunting through the Creative Commons section of Flickr for some handy images and ended up looking at Leigh Blackall's Networked Learning images. I loved the overcast sky on the first pic and that became the genesis of a simple idea for my own presentation. Armed with our Canon Ixus 500, I went out in the backyard and took some shots of the afternoon sky to use. My youngest child, Joshua, followed me out and I ended up pushing him on the swing for a fair while. This worked out well because the weather and clouds kept changing, presenting me with new potential backdrops.

One thing leads to another.... (Leigh's image first, followed by mine)
What's the point of this post? Not too sure but I think I've been somewhat influenced by the Daniel Pink book, "A Whole New Mind." If anyone couldn't tell, I've just finished the section on Design which is influencing the way I'm going to present my message. I've also read Story and some of my diagrams like my QuikMap of my Commenting Community will help with that aspect. Now to keep reading the section on Symphony to pull the whole thing together.

I attended an informative meeting tonight of educators interested in exploring the potential of blogging within our education system as a follow on from the Blogging Masterclass of last month. Now the purpose of this post is not to rehash the proceedings or the discussion from that hour, as productive as it was. I didn't take notes, so my recollections could be erroneous and I don't have permission to paraphrase other people's utterings. But I'd like to expand on what I think I see here in South Australia and whether we have the opportunity to establish and nurture an Education Blogging Community. The interest group consists of several experienced edubloggers, some educators who have dabbled but haven't launched into the full "blogging experience" and some beginners still working out what it all means for them. As for teachers who weren't at the Masterclass or participating in the comments section of the Masterclass blog, then it is impossible to gauge whether there is a community in the making or whether most teachers will just not want to know (too busy, too close to retirement, not confident, not informed, not caring!) and we are just indulging in wistful thinking. Considering that most bloggers have stumbled into this form of communication, a measured approach just might not work. And providing a sheltered place for interested educators to find out more (Moodle, Janison) is self defeating. Mastering the technology is just the first step. But users won't take that step unless they have some idea about the commitment, the purpose and potential of using a blog. I do think we need to focus on getting teachers to try blogging for themselves before we try and develop teachers blogging with their kids. The possible solutions to manage a class full of blogs are there but a learning curve needs to take place first before you even know the tools exist. This post from Dean Shareski really explains how the evolution could take place:

But if we as educators have never entered into a global conversation, it’s not likely we’ll ever create that opportunity for our students. But as we all know and I told the administrators, kids are already having them so when will we?

I think that the Masterclass blog (or a new one if needed) is a reasonable starting point for interested teachers to start dabbling. I am prepared to share things I've learnt along the way at that online venue and get others commenting and joining the conversation. I'd offer more beginner type stuff that I wouldn't post here because I believe the vast majority of my readers are ahead of me anyway! The more I think about it, becoming part of a blogging community is a very organic experience and can't really be planned or organised - an interest group can plant some seeds and watch to see if it grows. The group needs to support our less experienced but equal partners or risk having them turned off and their spark of enthusiasm snuffed out by the wind created by over fast movement. I realise that students are interacting online (often unsafely) and that they need guidance and structured opportunity. They need teachers who have some expertise and answers to the non-technical aspects of interacting with and publishing to a potential global audience. So I think we (the interest group) should set up a starting point for teachers who want to know more and use the expanded Masterclass blog as a jumping off point.

My recent post, Is It Possible To Have Self Directed PD? attracted some quality responses via comments and pingbacks which confirmed my ideas could and have worked before. Thanks to all who have contributed either to provide examples or additional thoughts. I would highly recommend downloading the pdf file that Doug Johnson provided. Titled "The 21st Century Educator", it is a highly developed professional development program with rubrics, growth targets and exemplars. Although it would need a fair bit of Australianisation, what I really like is the structure it would bring to what would essentially be a "just in time" program for my colleagues.

I'm confident that my principal can see value in my proposal after an interesting ICT Committee meeting on Friday. We were talking about the increased pressure on valuable work time when our very capable network manager (who also has quite a few other admin responsibilities) is treated by a lot of our staff as the on call help desk. Sometimes, I attract that sort of requests for help as well. The requests, which all take time and goodwill, range from unjamming printers to showing someone how to do an e-mail attachment to printing off a class list to troubleshooting unplugged cables. Ann, my principal then said that it sounded like a lot of staff needed "just-in-time" skills training so that they could solve these problems on their own and allow the admin time to be well used. Bingo! I gave a thumbnail sketch of my proposal and we also agreed to draw up an ICT technology skills register of staff members so that we all could be become each other's help desk instead of relying on the goodwill and expertise of one or two people. These skills acquisitions are different to my self-directed learning proposal and need to be kept separate but the value of people starting where they are and looking at mapping their way forward is exactly the mindshift us 21st educators need to take.

I've been pondering a rethink of the ICT training and development opportunities that I might provide my staff in 2006. Part of my role description here at my school calls for me to provide T&D to improve skills and confidence for my onsite colleagues. So in previous years, I've run courses on FrontPage, digital cameras, saving files to our network, trouble shooting where I've designed a step by step approach with handouts, examples, personal support and explicit demonstration. Has it improved the overall skill set of our staff? I'm not convinced. For example, my FrontPage course started with 10 participants which dropped to 8 the following week when a couple of junior primary teachers couldn't see the relevance of designing web pages for them. A few more dropped out halfway through when they acquired the basic skills they were after and eventually two continued to the bitter end. One staff member moaned that I responded to the loudest voices when they wanted help, some others wanted handouts with step by step instructions and a couple needed to start from the beginning of every session. Clearly, the one size fits all model doesn't work with learners, especially adults who have their definite preferred learning style and who, like kids, all have different levels of confidence, experience and expertise. So, inspired by my own experiences in the edublogosphere and Leigh Blackall's concept of Networked Learning, I am trying to draw up a plan that would guide my interested staff members towards self directed professional development. It's still embryonic so naturally I'm gonna put what I've got here and if anyone [please!] wants to give me feedback/suggestions/ridicule, I'm all ears. Here goes:

2006 LNPS Staff ICT Personalised Learning Program
Proposal for regular T&D opportunities on Tuesday afternoons.
Rationale: We are in the business of lifelong learning - developing this in ourselves will help us to facilitate this mindset in our students. ICT and e-learning have developed to the stage where we can personalise our learning experiences - new technologies are constantly providing us with better ways of connecting to others, documenting our own practice and developing our own content.
The IWB program needs to be supported with a regular time set aside for (1) the practice and use of the IWB, (2) planning and designing of own resources and lessons, (3) finding, reviewing and bookmarking of relevant/useful online resources, (4) professional reading and connection and (5) personal professional reflection.
Teachers may also wish to develop other skills related to specific software applications (desktop and online) by accessing online tutorials and courses to work through. The goal is for teachers to become self-directed, self-paced "just in time" learners, so that they can acquire ICT knowledge and skills from multiple sources and modes of instructions.
In my role as Coordinator, I would assist teachers to put together a Personalised Learning Program (as the guide on the side). Each week, a limited number of slots would be available for closer personal assistance while other staff would work in a more independent mode, using each other and a network of outside educators developed over time via social software (bookmarking, blogs, forums). Time spent would be documented and count towards DECS professional development hours requirement.

 Does it even make sense? Any suggestions? Help!!!!

Now even though I'm officially on holidays and enjoying the time with my wife and kids, I still find a chunk of time in the day to check on the edublogosphere and participate in the conversations. Yesterday, I checked out some parts of the World Bridges New Year's webcast marathon. It was a bit like running into someone you know at the supermarket when Jo McLeay surfaced in the chatroom as we have followed each other's blogs for a while now. Typical Australians - our first greetings involved the weather (scorchers two days leading into New Year) and she asked me if I was doing any IWB training at conferences interstate for 2006. I read this and thought, "Is she serious? I haven't even be out of the state to attend a conference. What would make her think I had any credentials in the IWB field?" Then I thought about all of the posts over the past six months re: our IWB implementation here at my school and maybe the way I've presented things via this blog and the team blog Activboarding makes me sound more expert than what reality says. I can't even recall my typed response to Jo. I don't know, maybe that little voice at the back of my head saying, "You don't know that much. Leave it to people further up the Pyramid Of Influence," that is the problem.

So, it was really interesting to read John Pederson's post today with his newly announced plunge away from conventional educational employment. It's got me thinking about the coming year and where it might be going. And you know what? What I do at my school is pretty good and I shouldn't undersell its importance in the least. I still have heaps to learn and could always improve but who is totally on top of things. I certainly don't want a Seachange in the same vein as John. So with a few weeks of leisure still ahead of me and when I still have time to pontificate, here are a few things I'm looking forward to as part of my job. (Caution: Half baked ideas may look good on the outside but may need to chucked in the bin if they are inedible.)

  • Another six or seven ActivBoards going into classrooms and the Resource Centre early in the year.
  • Restructure of my role gives me only half time in the class and half time in my coordinator role. This means an overhaul of the Problem Based Learning program, and me working with each class in the school for a 8 week block of 2 hours every week. One of those 2 hours to be spent on a class ICT Project - I'm thinking digital stories, blogs, information literacy skills etc.
  • My middle school team has a submission in to present at the 3rd International Middle Years of Schooling Conference. I wrote it and titled it "Engaging The Digital Native – Use Of New Technologies In The Middle School Classroom." (See abstract submission here.) We'll see how it goes.
  • A proposal to get more of my staff blogging for professional development. If I can convince my new boss (she's very tech savvy) then my goal would be to give teachers a chance to set up and maintain their own blog (at edublogs, where else) as well as a Bloglines account and give them accredited T&D time to read, comment and post their way to a better understanding of what faces them in the rapidly advancing world of Education 2.0.

Who knows what else will crop up? John knows for sure that in today's world, nothing is certain.

We're ready to roll in one of the double computer rooms and Janette Ellis is starting the day by walking us though the creation angle of her e-portfolio. Hers is HTML web page based - looks like it could have been created in FrontPage or DreamWeaver. As she explains, her e-portfolio was very text based but it operates on a very definite structure and incorporated a lot of links. She also pointed out that Paul's structure was well planned with layers of resource links within each section. In Janette's portfolio, images that she has chosen all illustrate skills or initiatives that she has expertise in. She also points out that an e-portfolio is a work in progress - she even goes to sleep with ideas about how to improve her portfolio buzzing around in her head.
Dr. Helen Barrett was next to tell us how her e-portfolio developed. She started her website in 2005 but her portfolio went from desktop to CD to Adobe Acrobat in format. The issue in 2000 was that her faculty had not seen a portfolio in CD form before so she had to supply a 10 minute video on how to navigate the CD! She included reproductions of attestions (what other people have said about you) and productions (photos etc. of things you have created/ been responsible for). She then started to take us through her online portfolio on her website. She trialled 17 different formats and has links to her versions of all of these.
We spent some time exploring mind mapping and how it can be used to organise the content and structure of a portfolio. I signed up for an account at Mayomi - free online mind mappirg tool. After a morning tea break, Helen started to show us how to organise artifacts using an Excel spreadsheet. This was then followed by a half hour setting up of a template plan in Word. I think we will be working on the next part - selection and reflection. I think I'll post back on that at a later time.