Instructional Technology's Role in the Curriculum

This week's JHU homework prompt is:

· As a school administrator and instructional leader, what instructional technology would you expect to see in the written, taught, and tested curriculum of a school or school district striving to meet the needs of 21st century learners?

Written Curriculum:

As an administrator, I would expect to see objectives in the written curriculum that would allow for flexibility for classroom teacher differentiation. More than naming specific technology, I would like to see learner outcomes that are achievable through a variety of ways, especially through the use of Web 2.0 applications. I would like to see the curriculum itself generated through a shared, collaborative space so that teachers would be able to contribute their ideas for effective practices and network with peers throughout the district. When teachers are given the opportunity to implement best practices in order for their students to learn and be able to accomplish the given standards, teachers can address their students’ diverse abilities. Each student’s strengths are recognized and provided for as the standards are met in a variety of ways.

Taught Curriculum:

As an administrator, I would work to create a taught curriculum that contains a variety of interesting learning opportunities, incorporating multiple technologies for teachers to choose from to deliver the content to their students. Words would be infused into the curriculum guides that would encourage tiered instruction, Socratic seminars, compact instruction for acceleration and a variety of grouping methods for instruction. The written curriculum should encourage the classroom teacher to challenge their students to achieve the objectives of instruction.

Tested Curriculum:

As an administrator, I would like to see a variety of assessment procedures to prevent “one size fits all” approach that is common with high stakes, standardized tests. I would work to see the addition of digital portfolios that contain a sampling of learner products covering instruction from in different subject matter areas, during a specific interval of time. I would like to see the use of video tapes showing student progress such as in a discussion or problem solving situation. Self evaluation by the learner of a completed project or other activity would be facilitated through the use of weblogs. Objects constructed related to an ongoing unit of study, using rubrics the means of appraisal could be uploaded to Flickr, SlideShare, Google Applications, or any number of Web 2.0 applications. The Tested Curriculum would dictate what is to be assessed, leaving the how to the classroom teachers and/or schools. The assessment would be a combination of formative and summative. I would advocate for these additional approaches to testing to ascertain learner achievement.

· What instructional technology would you promote to differentiate instruction for all learners? Consider some of the Web 2.0 tools discussed in Week 3 and some of the tools/ applications suggested in the UDL discussion.

The instructional technology that I would promote to differentiate instruction would not be specific to a particular brand or application, but a category of technology. This would allow for newer generation tools to be applied and prevent the addition of an obsolete technology in the ever changing 21^st Century technology arena. I would group the technology according to data collection, graphing tools, presentation tools, poster generators, translation tools, video and animation applications and rubrics generators. It is difficult to stay abreast of the latest technology available and that is why I would advocate the use of a Wiki or other collaborative site to host the curriculum in order to accommodate the rapidly changing technology landscape.

Conference Reflections

AASL 2009 conference has just passed and it is now time to put my thoughts on paper so that I can articulate them more clearly to my colleagues when they ask, "Well, how was it this year?"

The conference in Charlotte, NC was my 4th one, after Indianapolis (2001), Pittsburgh(2005), and Reno(2007). Somehow, I missed Kansas City in 2003!

According to an ALA news release, "A record breaking 3,950 school librarians, educators, exhibitors and guests attended the American Association of School Librarians’ (AASL) 14th National Conference in Charlotte Nov. 5 – 8, to discuss key issues that impact our nation’s school libraries. Dedicated solely to the needs of school library media specialists, the AASL National Conference is the largest gathering of school librarians in the nation."

If I had to rank my impressions of the conference "big ideas", this is how they would look:

1. Back-channel--According to Wikipedia (hey-for social media-this encyclopedia is pretty good!), back-channeling is the practice of electronically passing notes among some or all of the audience/students during the lecture. When sanctioned, this practice is particularly useful for speakers who are attempting to dynamically modify their presentations based on immediate feedback from the audience. Twitter was prevalent at this conference and it was so much fun to meet people that I "follow" and now can put a face to their profile. Most of the speakers uploaded their slides to SlideShare or other similar Web 2.0 tools, used Wikis to gather audience feedback and encourage the dialogue to stretch beyond the allotted time frame of the 1 hour and 15 minutes allotted for concurrent sessions by commenting to the wikis after returning home. Throughout the conference, participants were encouraged to upload their photos to Flickr and take everything with AASL2009. How exciting to be able to view the collective photo album that grew as the conference progressed.
   
   
   Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.
   
   The conference was made richer by the fact that so many of us were able to connect virtually to compare notes, share big ideas and communicate with others not able to be present face-to-face at the actual conference. Dave Loertscher, Buffy Hamilton, Gwyneth Jones, Buffy Hamilton are just a few of the speakers who relied heavily on audience participation and collaboration and the conference learning/participation was so much deeper because of this!


2. Learning Commons--What does it mean to be a librarian in the 21st century, how do we best serve our students and what does our space look like? Dave Loertscher was at his best once again, guiding us with vision and probing questions. His quest to reinvent school libraries and computer labs is infectious and his idea of collaborative knowledge building is viral. His wiki, http://www.schoollearningcommons.pbwiki.com/ is a great place to begin exploring his revolutionary concepts on media specialists becoming information coaches and library media centers becoming a completely flexible learning space where neither computers nor books get in the way. Getting Dave to autograph my newly purchased, The New Learning Commons: Where Learners Win! was a bonus of this conference!
   
   
3. Vendor Feedback--This was very prevalent this year. Companies are seeking out those of us who directly work with students to inform their businesses on how to best serve their stakeholders. We were wined, dined and pampered so that they could get us to carve out a precious time slot of our schedule at the conference. It is obvious in this economic downturn, that companies are vying for a piece of our budgets and are actively engaged in the business of providing the stakeholders with products that work for our students' learning. They did a fabulous job, questioning, probing and soliciting valuable feedback concerning their interfaces, search engines, marketing and promotion, and content of their many subscription databases and print material. Their widgets, customer support, marketing materials and updated content was demonstrated at each event. Hungry for stakeholder feedback, we were guided in a lively discussions at breakfast, lunch or dinner by a variety of vendors and it was impressive to be able to contribute to the modification or creation of products that can directly benefit the students in our schools. The exhibit hall was packed with aisles of vendors waiting to network with media specialists as they showcased their top products and demonstrated new features and products.


4. Nings--an online platform for people to create their own social networks--this concept is starting to make more sense with this conference. I joined my first Ning at NECC 2009 with the ISTE Ning or the Media Specialist group withing that Ning. Since then, I joined Joyce Valenza's Teacher Librarian Ning and many of the contacts I am meeting, I recognize from facebook, twitter and other social networking sites.


5. Green Conference--Yes, this conference was greener than most (but not totally!). Check here for handouts, and the b-There- Your Virtual Track Pass site has more information.


6. Blogs--I have made a public GoogleDocs with a list of the blog posts that I could find. Feel free to add to or edit the form and please share!


7. Personal Learning Network--Probably the biggest change in myself that I contribute directly to attending conferences is my willingness to share in my personal learning community (PLN); virtually, through a variety of social networking sites. I remember the excitement that I felt when my first tweet was retweeted by someone who was not my personal friend! That was a hallmark moment! The higher the quality of information I contribute to my PLN, the more I get out of it from my network. I contribute this phenomenon to the face-to-face conferences that nurture these relationships (although I admit, I may never meet all of my PLN!). I also put myself myself out there on blogs, facebook and nings as my network becomes intertwined like a net. I am constantly amazed each day with the quantity of new ideas and information that I learn every day via this ever-growing professional network of colleagues. This year I got to meet with Lisa Perez, Gwyneth Jones, David Loertscher, Doug Johnson, Buffy Hamilton and it was like meeting rock stars! So much fun! It makes it easier to cultivate relationships with that little bit of face-to-face.
   
   

Here are some of the mcps folks after the closing keynote as we cheer on Sara Kelley Johns for ALA President!

Joyce Valenza and Buffy Hamilton have challenged the participants of AASL 2009 to provide honest and constructive reflection on Charlotte Re-examined. Here are my thoughts on what could be at the next AASL in Minneapolis in 2011.

• Wireless Access--Need I say more? Fortunately, I was able to connect to the Internet most of the time I needed it. Unfortunately, wireless was spotty throughout the convention center and it was far from speedy...someday when conference planners tell convention planners to be prepared for a technology heavy conference with many people connecting to the Internet, we will be taken seriously! Additionally, many presenters were forced to present from PowerPoint slides as opposed to live from the web due to this situation.
  
• Electrical Outlets--This goes hand in hand with the previous comment. Along with Internet connectivity is the need to occasionally plug-in to charge-up! Unlike NECC, this convention center did not supply multiple outlets throughout the room and frequently, participants were jockeying for the perimeter of the room so that they could plug in to the wall outlets.
  
• Room Configuration--I found the rooms that provided the most conducive layout for collaboration were those with the round tables or those with the long rectangular tables. I was able to focus on the speaker and those around me when I was able to comfortably situate my laptop on a table instead of my lap. This was especially important for those concurrent sessions where the audience interacted with the speakers via Wiki, Twitter or some other Web 2.0 tool.
• Longer Smackdown Time--This fun, interactive, lively session was booked as a 1 hour 15 minute concurrent session. I could easily envision this session as a 1/2 day pre-conference and it would definitely benefit from the longer time as the audience could have more opportunities with which to interact with the presenters. If you have never been to one of Joyce Valenza's smackdowns, then you're missing a session loaded with good stuff and lots of energy. Montgomery County Maryland's own star, Brenda Anderson, collaborated with national colleagues to share digital storytelling strategies . We are so proud of her!
  

Lessons Learned at NECC 2009

This post has been brewing in my head for the past month and I am finally able to put a few thoughts down to share my experience with my colleagues.

This year was my first attendance at the International Society for Technology in Education's (ISTE) annual conference and exposition. This was the last year that they titled their annual conference National Educational Computing Conference or NECC. In the future, the conference will hold the same name as the organization. Next year, ISTE 2010 will be held in Denver, Colorado. Note to self: pack hiking gear for post-conference fun!

This year's 2009 annual conference was held in Washington, D.C. and mandatory attendance was a requirement of the A&S Certification program through Johns Hopkins University, in which I am currently enrolled.

While I have been to many, many school library conferences (national, state and local), this was my first all technology conference and the experience was quite rewarding. I am still processing the conference in my head and trying to decide what practices and technologies I will add to my repertoire this school year.

In order to meet the needs of the large membership of ISTE (20,000+), they have developed Special Interest Groups or SIGs. I joined the Sigms (Special Interest Group--Media Specialists) and it was fun to see the people that I normally see at the library conferences and they were totally immersed in the technology--blogs, wikis, twitter, and all things web 2.0.

Any of the breakout sessions or keynote talks, ISTE can be viewed on their ISTEvision .

One of my JHU cohorts, Scott Smeech, has created a handy spreadsheet that contains all of the blog postings containing anything on NECC 2009. It can be found at Google docs.

One of the best sessions that I attended at NECC 2009 was the Sigms Forum. There are several reasons why this session is in my top five.

1. It was at this meeting that I realized the full impact of being involved in a Sig. ISTE has around 20,000 members and it is in the Special Interest Groups where the rubber meets the road. I sat at a table of folks that I know from AASL, ALA and our state organization, MASL. Our table had at least 4 different school sytems represented. I enjoyed seeing "old" friends (we don't normally see one another during the year), collaborating with peers and discussing the upcoming AASL Conference in the fall.
2. It was at this session where I realized the full impact of using Wikis for collaboration. The Wiki for this session can be found at PBWorks. The session had four presenters who are leaders in the school library world. Each speaker has links to their presentation as well as ancillary information located right on the Wiki. While the room was organized well for everyone in the audience to see the panel and one of two large screens, the audience could also follow along with the presentations on their own laptops. I was creating bookmarks as people presented. I took notes electronically on Word. I was fully immersed in the presentation and I was working on integrating the topics into my repertoire right at the time of the presentation. This differs vastly from past conferences where notes were taken down by hand on notebook paper, links were furiously written down to access "later" and I sat passively and listened to the presenter talk. I never seem to get around to looking at the website when I arrive home after the conference and what do I do with all of those pieces of paper containing messy scrawl that can't be deciphered anyway?
3. I fully realized the potential of the "back-channel". I didn't know what a back channel was prior to NECC 2009! "Back-channeling is the practice of electronically passing notes among some or all of the audience/students during the lecture. When sanctioned, this practice is particularly useful for speakers who are attempting to dynamically modify their presentations based on immediate feedback from the audience." (Wikipedia) The audience sent tweets on Twitter and we were able to contribute to the presentation or follow other presentations in other areas of the conference in a least distracting manner. The presenters provided a Twitter Search string to make it convenient to follow! Sweet!

I can't emphasize the full power of the Wiki and I have accessed this particular session's Wiki numerous times since the conference. The Wiki allowed the presenters to be engaged with ALL of the audience and address issues that they may not have prepared for in advance, but can insert into their presentation ad-hoc. This two-way interaction made the session much more meaningful for everyone. I hope to integrate the use of Wikis into my library media program this school year. Joyce Valenza, Library Media Specialist extraordinaire in Pennsylvania has converted all of her library pathfinders into wikis and here is one example. I love the the embedded search widgets and the interactivity that can be achieved with students.

Besides the content of the sessions offered at NECC, I was also impressed by the variety of formats offered. Among my favorite formats are:

1. Playgrounds--single or multi-day events that provide educators with opportunities to "play" with interactive technologies for creativity and learning.I was asked to volunteer for a time slot in the 21st Century Media Center Playground to demonstrate Twitter. I had a great time visiting with conference browsers as they strolled through our area and I managed to convert a willing few to the "dark side" i.e. Twitter!! Several of us who presented created a Diigo group for all websites pertaining to Twitter.
   
2. BYOL (Bring Your Own Laptop)--These sessions were a big hit. I attended Joyce Valenza's Library Tools Smackdown as well as Earth Mashing: Web 2.0 Meets Google Earth. I hope that Joyce continues with her smackdown format at AASL as I know that sheh is a regular and favorite presenter there!
   
3. Birds of a Feather--Informal, one-and-a-half hour discussion format providing a special opportunity for like-minded educators to gather and network. Great networking opportunities with like-minded peers.
   

The technology used at NECC 2009 was phenomenal! Wireless access was everywhere (okay, sometimes spotty, but it was nice when we had it), ISTEvision was taping in almost session, keynote & meeting and then posted online using Ustream, everyone was a-Twitter! and people were more apt to use their Second-Life name than their "real" name! This blog post describes some of the technology from NECC 2009.

That wraps up my reflections, for now, and I hope to continue my journey with technology at the AASL Annual Conference and Exhibition, November5-8, 2009 in Charlotte, North Carolina. Hope to see you there!