The vision committee I’m a part of just shared a presentation with our faculty based on our site visits to California, about the ideas we’re bringing back to our campus.
It brought back to me the excitement of the trip, the excitement of feeling like a education professional, and the excitement of believing that so many of us on our campus have so many untapped passions and abilities. At the end of the presentation, we ask:
I have to admit, and this isn’t the first time I’ve mentioned this, that the one thing I am over-the-top excited about is thinking about opportunities for cross-curricular connections that would take our curriculum to a new level and engage students in a whole new way where ideas relate to one another, not just in one great class, but all day long. I believe the library can play a large role in that, and I also feel it’s the way we all learn in “real” life.
I don’t exactly know what I am envisioning or looking for in terms of “school” yet, but I know what it feels like–it feels dynamic, it feels like there is a “buzz” when you walk in the door of the school because something exciting is happening there, it feels like students and teachers alike are enthused to be there, it feels like people listen to and support one another, it feels like we work as a team.
I’ve always thought it would be exciting to work at a dotcom company–maybe it used to be my secret ambition, and I think the reason was that “buzz” and excitement that you sense in those environments….you can feel the innovation oozing from the walls and in the corridors.
And I’d also like the library to have that “buzz”–(which some days it does)–of students and teachers in an innovative physical space, working together, talking, reading, creating, and sharing their excitement about learning.
I see the infusion of technology as a big part of that for our students, because it is a natural part of their lives, and feeling innovative is exciting to them, and excitement creates enthusiasm for learning.
So what I come to work every day for is that enthusiasm for learning–I see my job as trying to support that in the classroom as much as I can.
I also want teachers to use the library as “their” space and not see it as “my space,” (pardon the pun), and to see it as a real resource for learning, reading, meeting, conferencing, etc. I want our new facility design and policies to reflect that.
Today is the first official day of Spring Break for most Texas schools, and thankfully, the weather will actually be spring-like also!
Most of us are long overdue for a mental break! I’m looking forward to time to read, reflect, and mainly just rejuvenate.
It’s enjoyable just to be in Austin for the break–SXSW started last night, which is our huge music, film, and interactive technology festival and it creates this incredible sense of energy here. Independent films are showing all over town and later in the week the music festival starts. My insider tip with the films is to go to the earlier shows–the serious attendees usually sleep in, and so there are seats available at the earlier showings, even without a film pass to the festival. Once the music festival starts, there are always lots of free “preview” shows at Waterloo records and different venues around town also.
As much as I like what I do, sometimes you need the time to slow down and reflect, let your thoughts mill around, re-connect with your “non-work” life, and get the creative juices flowing again. I’m looking forward to that.
Update 3/11: We went to see our first SXSW movie of the week today–Silver Jew(which is the name of an renowned but somewhat reclusive indie music group). The film is about their first music tour, which took them to Jerusalem. The filmmakers were there for questions after the film, and commented how amazing it was that they were able to take their camera into the historic parts of the city without any difficulty.
I’ve noticed more students using Cha-Cha lately, which is a search engine with a twist.
You can search yourself, or search “with a guide.” When you search with a guide, a chat window comes up and the guide immediately starts completing the search. As they find results they post them on the screen, and you can chat with them as they look or clarify your search.
It’s easy to use, though I found the results faster myself than with the guide. But I think perhaps students like the idea of having the live help during their search. I’ll be interested to see if this tool takes off.
Welcome to our second “Friday blogging” day on our campus, where we ask our staff or outside contributers to rush on down and spend a few minutes reading and commenting!
Feel free to join in….
Note: (If you are visiting the blog from elsewhere, the Chipotle blogging is a campus joke, by the way, based on a much-welcome donation of burritos).
How can we help our students use wise behaviors online?
That question has been getting a bit of discussion lately because of a recent article in the New York Times.
I’ve been thinking it would be interesting to compile a collaborative list of online “ethics” questions for students to discuss and consider.
The article has been getting some interesting discussion in the blogosphere, for example at the Science Leadership Academy.
How do we deal with opening boundaries for students to participate while helping them understand appropriate and ethical choices?
Update–:
After I wrote this, I ran across this fitting comment at Ed Tech Journeys–entitled “Kill the Messenger.” Pete Reilly wrote, “Technology is exposing issues that have always been there. This is a grand opportunity to explore the issues and to hear the message. Let’s learn whatever lessons need to be learned. Let’s not turn the technology off. Let’s turn teaching and learning on.”
I highly recommend the rest of his comments, and tend to agree that many(though not all) of the problems we are dealing with currently are just being exposed by the technology, not caused by it.
Karl Fisch at Fischbowl, created a video called Did You Know? earlier this school year, and shared it with his staff at Arapahoe High School in Denver, as well as posting it on his blog. Scott Mcleod of Dangerously Irrelevant, a professor at University of Minnesota, modified it slightly (with Karl’s permission).
The video was posted on other blogs, and today I received it in an email from a teacher and our principal here. It’s now circulating via email and in the corporate world.
Karl works at a high school. His video is now being viewed worldwide.
Text messaging while in class, listening to an iPod, and skimming through Google links, the behaviors our students are demonstrating in the classroom are the ones they are also carrying into the workplace.
This post on Assorted Stuff drew my attention to the Pew Internet study, Digital Natives Invade the Workplace, (among other studies on Pew’s site). The study summarizes five ways in which our multi-tasking, ever-”on” students are changing the workplace.
All of these have relevant implications for the classroom.
First, video games–over 70% of teens and almost all college students play video games, according to the study. One impact–workers/students want a project to complete and then want to “move to the next level,” and not be dictated the number of hours required. Actually, schools already do assign homework in this way, but the workplace generally doesn’t.
Second, according to the report–students are “technologically literate but that does not necessarily make them media literate.” One insurance company, Swiss Re, is actually offering a program next year to train their new employees how to find and evaluate quality information, including that from subscription databases, because they have a problem with employees grabbing the first thing they find on Google. Dow Jones has a similar training effort with their employees.
As a librarian, this as always leads me to the questions–how can schools help students in this regard? If we as teachers are satisfied with our students finding all their information on Google and don’t teach them to use databases or to evaluate their sources, or dig deeper, then they will carry poor habits away with them. When we complain about the poor quality of the local news or the poor writing in a news article, where do we think those reporters are coming from?
Third–today’s students are content creators. Over half of students have posted something(blog, photos, myspace page, etc) online. But often new employees (and our students) don’t know where to draw the line between what is appropriate to post or what’s not.
There are an increasing number of cases where employees have used cell phone cameras to capture an image embarrassing to a company and posted it, consequently losing their jobs.
Are we teaching them in schools how to manage tools like their cell phones? Is banning them from classrooms enough? Do we need to teach them how to draw the line or create policies for what is appropriate to photograph and post? How do we create a set of internal controls that doesn’t feel emprisoning, but offers students guidance on what crosses the line? Are we having conversations about that in the classroom?
Fourth–our students are rankers. This one hadn’t occurred to me, but makes sense. Our students are used to ranking teachers online, ranking their school, ranking American Idol contestants , ranking music, ranking teams, etc., and making very public comments in their rankings.
Two questions arise to me here–are we ever capitalizing on that skill and asking them to rank things in our classrooms and libraries, so we can talk about ranking?
And again, some word about the public nature about what they are doing and appropriateness seems like it would be helpful here.
We tend to ban those sites from the network, but does that prevent us from discussing them and helping students be more prudent in their use or comments? Employers are finding difficulty with employees freely posting information, ranking, or commentary about their employer in ways that aren’t necessarily appropriate to be aired in the public forum that is the internet.
Fifth–our students are multi-taskers and they will be bringing that quality to the workplace. Like our lives, their lives are increasingly a blend of work and play, simultaneously, as they listen to their iPod while doing homework online while imming with their friends. Work/homework becomes a more fluid thing.
A skill I find I myself need work on when online is how to remember my original task. I start reading one site, jump to another that’s mentioned and five sites later am trying to recall where I came from or what was my original intent? I’m trying to train myself to use tools like bookmarking the sites on delicious or in my favorites so I can recall them later.
The Pew report has interesting implications for the classroom, and it’s definitely recommended reading. The overarching need I see is the need for conversation with students as opportunities arise in classrooms across the curriculum, and the need for it to happen on a more institutional basis, that is, not just by accident, but by design. How can we build opportunities into our curriculum and where, so that we are helping our students be ethical, wise and constructive contributors to this enormous global conversation?
On a personal note, I would like to pay tribute to Beth Rogers. For those readers outside our campus, Beth was the librarian at our ninth grade center, a facility which is attached to my library.
She passed away this morning after a several year struggle with cancer. She was vivacious, spirited, and smart. I hate to use the cliche that she was courageous, but she really was. She worked even when ill to train our new staff before she retired earlier this fall. She had a varied career, from district librarian in East Texas to State President of ATPE, to librarian at our campus.
I know she might dislike for me to say something in this public a forum, but maybe she’d understand.
I relied on Beth’s common sense and support a great deal, the more reponsibilities I had, probably more than I had realized. I wish I had told her that more often.
So this is just my reminder to tell people more often about the good that they do and about what you appreciate. Remember to focus on the important things. And remember that the contributions you make each day to students and staff go far beyond what you ever truly realize.
And I’d also like the library to have that “buzz”–(which some days it does)–of students and teachers in an innovative physical space, working together, talking, reading, creating, and sharing their excitement about learning. 
I also want teachers to use the library as “their” space and not see it as “my space,” (pardon the pun), and to see it as a real resource for learning, reading, meeting, conferencing, etc. I want our new facility design and policies to reflect that.
