More to think about

I always read Borderland, but Teaching the Controversy gave me more to think about than usual. In addition to talking about teacher rights, he talks about teaching the curriculum. He discusses the idea of teaching the curriculum and teaching about the curriculum. He says:

The adopted curriculum might actually invite discussion and controversy if you study the curriculum document itself with students.

and

My thinking is that if we take a critical stance toward curriculum, we can still use it, and at the same time question it’s content, viewpoint, assumptions, and relevance. Along the way we can teach what it intends for students to learn, and we can also think about why. Learning that’s embedded in a real social context stands a far greater chance of making sense than simply reading through a catalog of goals and objectives.

I wrote the curriculum in my last job. And I never once shared it with my students. We never had that all-important discussion about why they were learning what they were learning. I never gave them the opportunity to question my assumptions or the curriculum's relevance. Not in any formal way, that is. We talked a lot about how we could improve the program, but we never did it in conjunction with the curriculum. I can only imagine what insight I might have gained if we had done that.

Many of my K-12 teacher friends struggle with a mandated curriculum that they feel doesn't allow them to do much real teaching. I wonder if Doug's ideas about sharing the curriculum with the students would help. Would it even be possible? As long as the curriculum is the enemy, it controls our lives. But if we make it our own, study it with our students as Doug suggests, maybe -- just maybe -- we can all learn something from it.

Freedom of Speech

Doug over at Borderland has a very thought-provoking post called Teaching the Controversy. In it he talks about the case of Deborah Mayer who lost her job because she told her elementary school teaching job because she told her students she honked for peace. A US court of appeals ruled that the school board was justified in firing her. According to an article in the San Francisco Chronicle,

As a federal appeals court in Chicago put it in January, a teacher's speech is "the commodity she sells to an employer in exchange for her salary."

My first reaction to reading that was amazement. Then it was disgust. Then I thought about the fact that I was bound, in my last job, not to publicly advocate anything that was in opposition to the teachings of the Catholic Church. And it hadn't bothered me. Of course, I don't publicly advocate much of anything. And I never felt that it limited my freedom to say what I wanted to about any topic in my classroom. My students always knew who I am and what I believe in. But in spite of my own feelings of freedom, I basically gave away my freedom of speech when I took the job.

What amazes me now as I think about it is the way I never really realized what was being asked of me. I just accepted it as something buried in the faculty handbook that didn't really apply all that much to me. And I am sure that Ms. Mayer never really thought about it either -- until she had lost her job.

But that is where the problem lies, I think. We need to be thinking more.

Am I ready to teach in the 21st Century? Are you?

I love reading Barbara Ganley! She has a great post about the 21st century college teacher. It is actually the written version of a talk she gave.

The talk begins quite unconventionally:

Because I am a writing teacher and because I believe you have to explore your own perspective on a topic a bit before hearing what someone else has to say, I'd like you to ponder this question for a few moments:

When does a speaker ask the audience to think about the topic before beginning her/his speech and really mean it? It makes so much sense, though. That is something I want to remember to do when I make my next presentation.

The entire post/presentation is fascinating. She concludes by saying:

Yes, my father was right, if we have any hope at all that reading and writing matter, that schools matter, we do have to change our way of teaching -- what we teach even-- to focus on creativity and resilience, boldness and deep listening and observing, on conducting research and collaborating in fluid online conversations, to create bonds with community and bridges between the personal and the other. In other words, a liberal arts education should expose us to ideas and perspectives and give us training in collaboration, communication and creativity. And we have the tools, right here, to help us do just that.

As I contemplate moving into a different classroom in a different school this fall, I want to be better at doing what Barbara does and what she advocates doing. I know that, in spite of how I have changed my teaching over the last few years, I am still learning.

I am going to go back and read Barbara's post again and again, I think. There is a lot there.

The end

Of my job, that is. I just got home from cleaning out my office. I am officially unemployed.

I have had some interviews. I withdrew myself from consideration for one when I realized it wasn't what I wanted to do. It became apparent in the first interview for another job that it wasn't going to be a good match. Then there was the cool second interview in San Francisco which also ended in no job offer for me.

But there are still applications out there, and I keep finding more. Something will happen -- soon, I hope!

Just a question

Why is it that with all the furor about students using iPods to cheat on tests, no one seems to be considering the fact that maybe it is the tests that should be changed? Yes, even with a test that requires students to think and write a coherent answer, they could use an iPod to cheat, but it would be a lot harder I think. And they would still have to take the information on their crib sheets and turn it into an essay that answered the question.

Update on the job hunt

Before the update, I would like to thank everyone who has taken time to leave a comemnt on my earlier post about losing my job. I can't tell you how much they helped! Not only did they help me not to feel so alone, but they also contained very good advice.

I have applied for a number of jobs and have had several interviews. Some have been better than others, of course. I actually had a second interview for one job. So far I have not been told that I am not getting any of the jobs for which I have applied. I am trying to accept the fact that I may have to be patient.

I have thought a lot about what many people have said: that I need to figure out what I want to do. I am getting closer to understanding just what that is. It has been an interesting process. And then there is the very real possibility that I will be offered a job that I am not sure I want. I hope it doesn't come to that because I am not sure how I would handle it.

You can be sure that I will blog about it when I get a job and/or when I really figure out what it is I would like to do with my life. Intil then, thanks for the good thoughts!

Sharing Knowledge

Yesterday morning I checked my email and found a message from a young man I did not know. He had looked at my old online portfolio and wanted to know how I had done different things because he had an assignment for a class to create an online portfolio and wanted to do something like mine. I hoped he was talking about my new portfolio because I couldn't remember anything about my old one, but he really wanted to know about the old one. So I looked at it again and tried to remember how I had done things. Since I didn't know very much when I created that one two years ago, it wasn't hard to reconstruct what I had done.

So Gabriel and I spent the day yesterday exchanging emails, him asking questions and me trying to answer. In the end, he had a great looking portfolio ready for his instructor to look at this morning. I feel kind of like a proud mother!

This sharing of knowledge is what makes the world so different today. It isn't about protecting what I know but about seeing how what I know complements what you know and what we can construct with our combined knowledge. It is about how we can learn from each other -- whether we are teachers or students, parents or children, from this country or that. All those divisions are, in some ways at least, artificial.

So I thank Gabriel for asking me to share my knowledge. I learned as much as I taught.

Who am I?

I have been trying to figure out why I haven't been able to post very often lately, and I think I have finally figured it out. The answer is so simple that I can't believe it took me this long, but it did.

Having my job end has been a lot more traumatic for me than I realized at first. As my impending joblessness has gone on for almost 2 months now, I realize how lost I feel. I really feel like I am having to reinvent myself now because there aren't many jobs in my field in places I want to live. So if I am not an ESL teacher, who am I?

Six years ago before I started in my present job, it was much simpler. I still had a child at home, so I was not as much defined by my job as I have become. Also, it has only been in the last ten years that I have really felt like I have a profession. Until then, I just went from job to job and had a good time.

Part of me wants to go back to those more carefree days, but I have really enjoyed the last ten years and feel I still have a lot to contribute to my students. I would like to continue in the field of ESL, but I am not sure how many sacrifices I am willing to make - or ask my husband to make - to do it.

All I know for sure is that I wake up each day a little less sure of who I am. On so many levels, I don't like that! I'm not sure how I got to be so defined by my job. It leaves me wanting to get another job -- almost any job -- just to end the agony of not knowing. But then the cycle would just begin all over again. There is obviously more to this than finding another job. But right now, I would settle for that!

Food for thought

Thanks to Derek, I found the Making Teaching Public website. The site offers a look at some great teaching and great teachers from around the country.

What impresses me most about the site is just how public these teachers have made their teaching. I wonder at times just how much of my teaching I am really ready to make public. There are days when I am ready for the world to see what I do, but there are other days when I find I would rather keep it quiet.

As I have made my teaching more public by putting it on Moodle, by including wikis and webquests and blogs, I have fewer moments that I wouldn't want others to see. Not that everything goes perfectly, but I feel more like I am following a coherent plan. The secret, I think, is that I reflect much more on my uses of technology than I used to in my strictly textbook-based days. While my reasons for doing what I am doing may not be any more valid than they were before, the fact that I have thought more about them and expressed them more coherently seem to give my classes a more solid base. And it gives me more confidence in them, too.

A Question of Vision

I was trying to catch up on my reading this morning, and I came to a post on Derek's Blog about a new National Science Foundation publication entitled Cyberinfrastructure Vision for 21st Century Discovery, which is available for download here. It is a 64-page document, and I have just started reading it, but I was immediately struck by a statement from Dr. Arden L. Bement, Jr., Director of National Science Foundation. He said:

At the heart of the cyberinfrastructure vision is the development of a cultural community that supports peer-to-peer collaboration and new modes of education based upon broad and open access to leadership computing; data and information resources; online instruments and observatories; and visualization and collaboration services. Cyberinfrastructure enables distributed knowledge communities that collaborate and communicate across disciplines, distances and cultures. These research and education communities extend beyond traditional brick-and-mortar facilities, becoming virtual organizations that transcend geographic and institutional boundaries. This vision is new, exciting and bold.

It is, indeed.

Miseducation

Thanks to Tim over at Assorted Stuff, I found a link to
Pete Reilly : Education's Hidden Messages. The post includes a list of some ways that our educational system is sending out the wrong message to students. Some of those ways include:

They are leaning that discovering and creating knowledge is beyond the ability of students and is really none of their business. ...

They are learning that the voice of authority is to be trusted and valued more than independent judgment. ...

They are learning that life’s answers lie outside themselves, in others. This lesson results, not only in students who believe others have their answers; but also that others are responsible for their problems. Students who have been taught this lesson take little accountability. ...

They are learning there is always a single unambiguous right answer to a question. If it can’t be measured, it’s not taught.

Unfortunately, I think that he is pretty close to being on the mark here. Even at the college level, too much is rote memorization -- especially in the first two years. I see my students agonize over upcoming tests, sure that they don't know the "right" answers. They never know what they are expected to know for the exam except that it is "Chapters 1-4 of the textbook".

The saddest part of what Reilly says, from my perspective, at least, is:

They are learning that risk taking is dangerous.

And, I guess, an awful lot of us past school age feel the same way.

Something has to change. And each of us, as an educator, has a responsibility to make an effort to improve the situation. We may not be able to eliminate the problems entirely, but we can improve the way we teach, what we teach and how we assess students in our own classrooms. It may not seem like much, but if enough of us do it...

(Crossposted from Moving Along)

"Next Blog"

After more than two years blogging on Blogger, I finally clicked on "Next Blog". I had always been curious but had never taken the time to check it out. I had heard horror stories of kids in school clicking on it and getting some inappropriate content, and I guess I figured that I wasn't all that intereted in what I might find. But tonight I clicked on it, and I was really amazed by what I found.

The first blog I got was in Chinese. I am not sure what it was about, but it had pictures of food and a few words in English. I thought that was pretty cool, so I clicked again and got a blog in Russian. And the third time I clicked, I got one in Portuguese. Finally on the fourth click I got one in English -- on Permaculture, of all things. The fifth one was in Spanish.

All of this got me wondering about the percentage of blogs that are not written in English. I know I have read about this before, but I don't remember what I read. I could see asking my students (adults) to do a little investigation on the subject. They could do informal research by starting at my blog and clicking "Next Blog" say ten times. For each blog they come to, they could be asked to write like an annotated bibliography in which they tell what language it is written in and, to the best of the student's ability to figure it out from photos or other clues if he/she can't read that langauge, tell what the focus of the blog seems to be.

This project could serve several purposes. It would give students a chance to do independent research. It would give them a reason to read a number of blogs, and it would give them the opporrtunity to write. Of all of these, though, I think I am most interested in the blog reading they would do. I have yet to really get my students to read blogs. This would be one way to give them a chance to see what is out there. From there, then, it might be easier to ask them to find a certain number of blogs on a topic they are interested in and read them regularly.

Too bad I may not have students to try this with next semester.

7 virtues of blogging

Kathy Sierra has posted a link to her slides from a recent conference presentation. They are, as usual, great. She talks about seven virtues of blogging if you want to develop a global microbrand. Even though I am not trying to establish a global anything, the advice is good. The virtues that really struck me were Be Generous and Show Respect. Kathy says, in part:

the fact that anyone comes to our blog at all is incredible. We must be grateful and try to give something of value in return.

and

Don’t post for quantity, post for quality. If you don’t have something that you believe is worth the reader’s time, think twice about posting.

If I were following that second piece of advice, I probably wouldn’t be posting right now! But these, and the other five virtues, are things I try to keep in mind as I blog.

But I would like to modify Kathy’s list a bit to make it more applicable to the way I blog. Here goes:

• Be Grateful - Appreciate the fact that readers have taken time to read and comment on your blog. Take time to let you know you appreciate them and their ideas. One way to do this is to return the compliment and comment on their blogs.
• Be Humble - Make sure you give credit where credit is due. Acknowledge those who have influenced your thinking. Remember that you can learn something from almost everyone.
• Be Patient - Accept the fact that your blogging is going to be a process. Most of us, at least, have to grow into it. Don’t look at the well-established blogs and think you have to be like them, as good as they are right now.
• Be Brave - Talk about the things that interest you — even if no one else seems to be interested in them right now. You may discover other people who are truly interested in the same things and visit your blog precisely because you are talking about a particular topic.
• Show Respect - Remember that diversity is what makes the world beautiful. Just as we wouldn’t want to live in a world with only one type and color of flower, we shouldn’t want to live in a world with only one set of ideas. We should all feel free to express our opinions, but we should always remember to do so in a respectful manner. Don’t get involved in name-calling or ridiculing others.
• Be Motivating - We can all use a little help from our friends from time to time. Don’t spend all your blogging time complaining or criticizing. Try to offer possible solutions to the problem — or at least ideas as to why the problem exists. Leave your readers with something positive.
• Be Generous - Support new bloggers by reading them, commenting, and then linking to them in your blog, too. It costs you nothing but a little time, and it could really help someone who is just starting out.

I think we could each explain these virtues in different ways. I would be interested in knowing how you would define them.

Note: Starting with this post, I am cross-posting on Random Thoughts and Moving Along, my WordPress blog. I am fairly certain that I want to combine the two blogs, and I really like WordPress better than Blogger anymore. I will let you know when/if I decide to stop posting here entirely.

Check out "Their Space"

Derek has an interesting post in which he talks about a publication called Their Space, which is available for download here.

The document makes a point that I think is a valuable one. It says:

If digital media in schools is to move beyond the ICT
suite and become truly embedded across the curriculum then all
teachers need to feel empowered to use it creatively. School leaders
need to build up support and professional development to ensure
that all staff feel empowered to use the technologies that resonate
with their students.

This seems to support what Miguel worte about a few days ago when he said we should introduce 1:1 laptop initiatives with faculty and administration rather than with the students. I wrote about this before.

I found the document interesting. I hope you'll read it.

Update: There is a podcast available here.

Start at the top

Miguel has hit on one place where the trickle-down theory really might work. He proposes starting a 1:1 laptop initiative with teachers and administration long before trying it with students. He says,

The change in district perspective is what important and that that perspective is communicated and adopted by parents, teachers, administrators. That perspective has to be that we're going to learn differently and everyone is a part of that learning process. Teaching differently will come over time as we learn more.

This seems so logical to me. Starting with the students -- before teachers and administration and parents are on board -- doesn't have much of a chance of succeeding. But if we, the adults, change the way we view education and technology, we will be much more likely to create substantive change in our teaching and our students' learning.

This goes back to the concern I and many others have about new tools being misused to just do the same old same old in the classroom. In a teacher's defense, though, it is hard to do otherwise without being really comfortable with technology and using it regularly in your own life. That comfort and regular use would come as a school district institutes a 1:1 plan for teachers and administrators and they, as Miguel says,

then change the way everything is accessed and how the "system" works. Go electronic on everything as much as possible.

Miguel talks about the need for a comprehensive plan to make sure all this happens, and I am sure that would make it easier and more efficient. But sometimes I think plans -- too many plans, at least -- can take the joy out of anything. And I also don't think we need to wait for plans, really. I think we can create change by creating a tipping point in each school. If nothing else, that may encourage institutions to develop a plan faster than they would have otherwise.

Read Miguel's post. It's another good one.

Time to reflect

I have been trying to go back and look at posts that I have clipped in Bloglines the last few days, and I ran across this one by Anne Davis in which she reports on a TRLD Conference speech by Ellin Oliver Keene about giving students time to think and teaching them about thinking. I was struck by the obviousness of this, the simplicity of it. And yet, looking at my own classroom, I wonder how much I do it.

I know that I feel a tremendous amount of pressure to have something "happening" in my classroom all the time. It has to be something we can all see for it to be real, too. Reflection doesn't seem to fit the bill. And yet I know it is important. Obviously, this refelction could take the form of journaling, but sometimes that just doesn't seem appropriate.

I was told once that there wasn't much sense in me sitting with my students in the computer lab as they worked on different activities. The feeling was that there should be more direct instruction going on. And yet, if I don't see where students have questions, how do I know what to teach them?

I wonder sometimes if this isn't somehow connected to our discomfort with silence. We seem to feel a need to fill the void silence creates rather than appreciating its value in our lives.

Wherever I end up in my next job, I want to build time for reflection into it. Sounds simple, doesn't it?

New Beginnings Ahead

Last week I received some news that I had been expecting, but it came as a shock at the same time. The decision has been made to close our ESL program at the end of the semester. That means that after six years here, after taking an idea on paper and turning it into a successful ESL program, I will be unemployed.

As I said this was not really a surprise. Other big programs in our area and across the country have closed, so it was only a matter of time before ours disappeared, too. Our enrollment has been on the decline for the last two years at least, and it no longer pays the salaries of myself and my colleague.

And it has been a very good six years for me. I have learned so much about myself, about teaching, and about establishing a program like this. I have had the support of the institution to make conference presentations both in this country and abroad. I have developed as a professional in ways that I could never have imagined six years ago.

And now it is time to move on. At this point in time, there is no clear plan. I am applying for jobs both locally and elsewhere in the country. I think it may be time to reinvent myself a bit. Since ESL programs have been cutting back for awhile now, I am looking at different kinds of positions at community colleges right now. It is exciting -- and a bit sad at the same time. I know there is something else out there for me; I just have to find it!

My student's blog part 4?

I forget how many times I have posted about my student's blog, but I am happy to report that comments are now up and running on his blog. The comments that were made earlier and which he received in email messages seem to have vanished, though. Oh well...

I was really pleased with how quickly James Farmer responded to my questions. If you aren't using edublogs/uniblogs/learnerblogs/eslblogs, you might want to check them out. I especially like them for younger learners and ESL students.

Locked out of my own blog

I tried to post on Saturday, but I was locked out of my blog. It was suspected of being a spam blog. It wasn't until about 30 minutes ago (Monday afternoon) that I was able to log in and post and have my posts appear on the blog. I could only blog about it on my other blog until now.

I have been toying with the idea of migrating this blog to WordPress. I am seriously thinking about it now. I will let you know if I decide to do it.

I have already migrated my portfolio blog to WordPress and deleted the Blogger portfolio. It went really smoothly. (Thanks for the link, Aaron!) I know there are some things that don't work in WordPress as well as they do in Blogger (embedding video, for instance), but I am not all that likely to need to do that. I remember back in the early days of this blog, Nathan pointed out that not everyone can access embedded audio and video, so I try not to do it.

Anyway, I'm back!

Update on my student's blog

Well, we checked everything today, and there is still a problem with comments on my student's blog. I have contacted people at eslblogs, and I hope that when they are finished with a database upgrade, things will be better. In the meantime, please feel free to comment on his blog but know that your comments may not/probably won't show up on the blog itself. He is getting comments emailed to him, though, so he will know what you are saying.

He was, by the way, quite happy that people had read his blog and commented. So thanks from both of us!

As an aside, I talked to him about moving his blog to WordPress, but he would prefer to stay where he is. As I have said before, he is a little afraid of blogs, so I didn't push him on it. He is so happy with this project so far -- in spite of the problems -- that I don't want to mess with it.