Social Training Wheels

Posted on May 17, 2013 by Rachel

Should teachers and students be Facebook friends? Is it ok for a student and teachers to Tweet with each other? I have been involved in these discussions so many times and I see valid points in both sides of the argument.

On one hand….

Has there ever been a case of inappropriate relationships between teachers and students that couldn’t be traced back to a social media connection? There’s a lot of bad stuff out there and such tools are a distraction from learning at the least and a potential for real harm at worst. How would you monitor and control it? You can’t. You can only teach students what is right and the respond when they choose to do otherwise. There are other tools, such as MBC, that offer the same social components but provide the safety net that can protect students while also teaching them to behave appropriately.

On the other hand….

Facebook and Twitter connected us with a far bigger world – a world that has huge learning potential! Students and teachers can use these tools to connect with people in fields of study, experts, and gain cross-cultural experiences. They are tools so many are already using and checking daily. Are we going to throw those opportunities away because we’re too scared of what might happen?

As you can see, I’m a bit torn on this. I see so much good for education in these tools, but I’ve seen too many hurtful posts, indecent pictures and inappropriate student/teacher relationships to just jump in and embrace it. People who are opposed to filtering and blocking content at schools always argue that students need to learn through experience. I agree, but I also don’t think they have to learn the hard way through a negative experience. I think we should be more proactive than that. Perhaps my views are affected by being a parent. I have the responsibility to teach my children right from wrong and I think it is possible to overprotect them in a way that hurts them more than helps them. But I still protect them. When they were learning to walk I didn’t just sit there and watch them hurt themselves over and over. I held their hands for a while. I guided them away from sharp corners and covered the outlets. Over time, I held their hand less and gradually allowed them to try on their own. Yes, I knew they would still take some falls when I let go, but I waited until I knew the pain would be minimal. It is the same with learning to ride a bike. We start with training wheels. At some point, they have to come off, but we don’t just put our kid on an adult bike and send them down a hill.

So for now, I have adopted these positions:

I use Facebook for personal connections only, and do not accept friend requests from students until after they graduate.
I use Twitter professionally. I haven’t actually received any student followers (I don’t think) because they don’t care about the professional stuff I post on Twitter, but I do not restrict my tweets. It has played a HUGE role in developing in my Professional Learning Network and I have grown in immense ways through the people I connect with there.
I promote and support My Big Campus fully (hence the little “MBC Coach” badge next to my name). I think it is kind of like giving students a social platform with training wheels. It allows them to learn, teaches them how to do better when they do make errors of judgement, but does it in a safe environment where they are protected from real harm.

So when is the right time to take the training wheels off? I think it probably is before they leave k-12 education, but only after we’ve given them sufficient practice in a safe environment. Maybe another year or two into our 1:1 and we’ll be able to do this with our older kids. But there have been enough of these issues in the last few months with these tools restricted that I can’t say we’re there yet. The students need to show they are mature and responsible enough to handle it, and it’s our responsibility to get them to that point.

Achieve 3000

Posted on February 8, 2013 by Rachel

Taking the Plunge

At Southwest Parke we are using a huge number of digital resources that are changing the way we do school. It is incredible how much quality content is available that’s free for education. However, there are a few areas that are worth some investment. Achieve 3000 is a differentiated reading program we have purchased, focusing on comprehension of informational text. After conducting an initial assessment, Achieve delivers news articles supplied by The Associated Press to each student at their unique reading level. Students answer opinion polls, complete comprehension questions based on the article, and write responses to critical thinking questions. In doing so, they see exponential growth in their reading comprehension skills, and teachers receive continuous data to guide their instruction.

You can discover a lot about exactly how the program works on their website, but I’ve put together a short video so you can hear directly from a couple of our students and see some of our actual results. There is no doubt that adding more digital content and greater differentiation into our curriculum is benefiting student learning.

Why We Made The Investment

Although we have made lots of progress in recent years, our students were still not showing the growth and success we wanted them to have (you may be able to relate). We know that differentiating learning produces results because it provides each student with exactly what they need. It doesn’t take a genius to understand that concept, it just was so very difficult without the technology tools in place. Our first experience was with ALEKS to provide differentiated learning in math. We saw what a huge difference it made and sought something to provide the same benefits in reading comprehension, recognizing that there is no skill more fundamental to success. A student who doesn’t understand the non-fiction text they read will struggle in all academic areas. Achieve 3000 seemed to be the perfect solution at the perfect time, as we were also implementing 1:1 and digital curriculum initiatives. We began using Achieve in grades 3-9. When we saw such rapid results and realized that our freshmen needed more time to close the achievement gap, we expanded to provide Achieve for grades 10-12 as well.

The Early Harvest

As shown in the video, we have seen a very quick return on our investment with increased student Lexiles, but there have been other positive outcomes. We’ve seen students come alive that had no interest in school or the quality of their work before. The immediate feedback they receive, the fact that the content is on their personal level, and the motivating elements are appealing to both non-traditional and typical students. Here’s a story that didn’t make the video…. I met with a junior who is using Achieve to help him pass the ECA test. Although he is quite intelligent, he is a student who makes it known how much he loathes school, and his lack of success shows his attitude toward education. I asked him how he felt about Achieve, expecting the same sort of answer I had always heard from him. Instead, he paused and quietly said, “I don’t hate it.” If you know students like this, that’s saying a lot. We have students who would never complete homework assignments that are now getting on and completing several Achieve articles per week from home. The high achievers are benefiting as well because the program puts no limits on how much they can advance.

Keys to Success

Teachers – As with any resource, you get out of this program what you put into it. Although powerful enough to produce some results even on “auto pilot”, the real success comes when teachers interweave their reading, writing and language arts instruction into their use of Achieve 3000 articles. It is also a very effective means of providing complex informational text in science, social studies, health and other content areas.

Students – Students have to learn to take some responsibility for their own learning. This is one of the added benefits, teaching them to be more independent learners. A student who skims the articles and clicks through questions isn’t going to grow. The program does have some things built in to catch this sort of behavior, but a high level of accountability for quality of work goes a long way. I think it also helps if the students learn exactly why their reading skills are so crucial to their success later in life and know some specific things to do (and what NOT to do) when they are using the program. To that end I created a Student Guide to Achieve 3000, which has been presented in most classes.

Administration – Monitor data. I can’t emphasize that enough. Achieve provides an enormous amount of customizable reports that paint a good picture of progress or the lack thereof. If students aren’t growing, drilling into the data often reveals the reason, which can then be corrected. You won’t be successful with a weight loss program unless you monitor your food and exercise. You won’t stay on budget unless you track your spending. Students won’t grow to their fullest potential with any learning program unless you use data to guide instruction and implementation.

Ready to Transform Learning Through Differentiation!?!

Watch the promo video below and visit Achieve’s website to learn more about how the program works and the research behind it. Contact me if you have questions you’d like to ask a real school instead of a company or if you’d like to visit us to see it in action! If you’d like to schedule a presentation, contact Diane Baldessari (pssst…. she’ll probably bring snacks!).

Pinterst Resources for Education

Posted on October 25, 2012 by Rachel

Videos, Tutorials and information to help teachers effectively use Pinterest as an educational resource. Connect with educators within and outside of your own district to find great resources for curriculum, classroom management and organization.