Internet use makes for more engaged citizens

Lots of stuff going on today. So you’re gonna get a different format this afternoon. Summary statements and bullet points. That’s it.

Okay . . . maybe a photo or two. But seriously. That’s it.

Here we go.

The Youth and Participatory Politics people say that being online is good for kids because:

• Their interest in the Internet translates into engagement with civic and political issues.
• It is rare for individuals on the Internet to only be exposed to political perspectives with which they agree.
• Teaching new media literacies such as credibility assessment is essential for 21st century citizenship.

Why?

Mills College education professor Joe Kahne, the author of the study says that “both in the U.S. and abroad, so much civic and political life is online. We’ve got to pay attention to new media when we think about civic learning.”

Who?

• Youth and Participatory Politics interviewed 2500 kids and followed 400 of those for 3.5 years.

So what?

• We need smarter filtering in schools so that more voices can be heard by students.
• We need to engage kids in online communities, specifically ones that discuss civics and politics.
• We need to use tools that our kids are using – texting not email, Edmodo not wikis, news aggregators not newspapers, mobile devices not desktops.
• We need to increase digital literacy levels among our kids.

The end.

Really.

Nothing more to see here. You may go about your business.

Before going nuts with the iPads . . .

I had the opportunity a couple of years ago to watch, from start to finish, a new house construction. It was an incredible learning experience. One of the coolest things I walked away with?

Always use the right tool for the job.

I was raised on the concept that a roll of duct tape, some bailing wire, big hammer and a good pair of pliers is pretty much all you need. It was an eye-opener for me to watch these construction guys pull out some incredibly specialized tool, get the job done in seconds and move on to the next thing.

My takeaway for today? We need way less duct tape in education.

It seems as if we as educators believe that we can do everything with only a couple of tools rather than carrying around a really big tool kit. It also seems that those “couple of tools” that we carry around tend to be whatever’s the latest craze. We get sucked into believing that textbooks will solve all of our problems or that, no, we should be using just online materials. Lecture, no lecture. PBL. Primary sources. Multi-age classrooms. Same-sex classrooms. Web 2.0. Social media.

The answer really is . . . all of the above. There are times when each of these concepts is the appropriate tool to use.

This brings me to iPads and other mobile devices. I admit – I love shiny things. And I love my iPad. But we need to be careful that, before rushing into this brave new world of mobile devices, we ask yourselves a few questions.

And I’m very impressed with the list of questions that Howard Chan has put together. Howard works as Director of Technology for a K12 public charter consortium in San Diego, California and, while he’s also an advocate for mobile devices, he wants people to think critically before going too nuts about 1-to-1 iPads implementation.

With minimal edits, I’ve pasted his list below to “serve as a guideline to planning out iPad/iPod/tablet/mobile device deployments.”

Academic questions:

• How do the iPods and iPads align with your curriculum?
• How much professional development in their use will be available? Who is responsible for PD?
• How do we hold teachers accountable for using the devices?
• Are there planning/collaboration times to share best-practices?
• How will you assess the effectiveness of using the mobile devices?
• Are there data and assessment tools built into the iOS to gather quality data of student achievement?
• Is there a curriculum vision for the iPods and iPads? Does it align with the school’s mission?
• How will parents/community be involved if students are bringing the devices home?
• Are the educational apps available enough to support your curriculum?
• Are there enough content creation tools to replace the traditional computer desktop/laptop?
• How do you assess the educational value of purchasing iPods/iPads? versus Total Cost of Ownership?

Technical issues:

• Do you have enough wireless bandwidth to sustain dense populations of mobile devices?
• Do you have a big enough Internet pipe to sustain the network traffic?
• Will you create a separate wireless network for mobile devices with different policies?
• What authentication policies are in place to access the wireless network?
• How do you plan to filter browsing on these devices?
• Will you allow teachers or students to install apps on the devices? Or will it be centrally managed?
• Will you allow teachers or students to configure settings on the devices? Or will it also be centrally managed?
• Do you plan to be part of the Apple Store Volume Purchasing Program?
• Will your IT staff be trained on how to support mobile devices?
• Will you allow students to take the devices home?
• What AUP will you have on mobile devices?
• Will you allow personal mobile devices on campus?
• Does Flash incapability hinder any present network considerations?
• Will the ability to NOT print be an issue?
• Do you go 1:1 or shared mobile cart?
• What mobile cart solution will you have? Where will it be stored? Check out system?

The iPad is a great tool and one that I think we need to use more. But like any tool, let’s be careful to use them as needed – not just because they’re shiny.

TubeChop is easy and cool

Have you ever found a really cool YouTube video but wanted to use just a shorter chunk of it? As YouTube as upped the limit of video length this started to become more of problem for me. I also wished that I could find a way to embed that shorter chunk on my web site.

So I went longer for a solution.

And found a free, easy answer at TubeChop. TubeChop does exactly what it sounds like it does. It lets you search for YouTube videos via keyword or by copying and pasting in the actual video URL. It then opens a screen with a simple editing slider ala QuickTime. Simply move the beginning and ending sliders and click Chop It!

You can view a quick sample I made of just the last few minutes of a longer clip from the movie Gettysburg.

You now have a unique url just for your chopped video that you can share. You also get an embed code that allows you to put the chopped video in all sorts of other places.

Depending on your school’s filtering system, this chopped video may or may not fly under the radar if your school blocks YouTube. Hopefully, it’s not blocked (at least not on your computer . . . you know, the one used by an adult professional teacher) and you can use TubeChop without any problems. But if you embed your TubeChop videos on a separate page of your class web site, kids can at least access them outside of school.

Give it a try and let me know what you think.

Gamification – Game theory in lesson plan design

I love the idea of using video games as part of education. And I’ve always said that we need to use the theory behind video game development as a way to create lesson and unit plan design.

Game developers are great believers in learning theories and brain research. They know that unless the brain is engaged in lots of different ways, people won’t play the game. If people won’t play the game, the game developers lose money. Educational game researcher James Gee in his book What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Literacy & Learning says it this way:

Better theories of learning are embedded in the video games many children play than in the schools they attend.

So when I found out about the site Gamification, I was pumped. Gamification is described as

the concept that you can apply the basic elements that make games fun and engaging to things that typically aren’t considered a game.

Gamification has a nice page that focuses just on the use of game theory on education. From that list I found a great article from the online journal Currents in Electronic Literacy titled Game Design as a Model for Course and Curricular Development. The article is a part of an issue that focuses on gaming in education. Useful stuff!

I also really like an article cited that talks about “gamifying” homework.

The idea that we can use game design ideas to create high-quality lesson plans and units can be a bit uncomfortable. But check out my earlier post as well as some of the artices listed and let me know what you think.

Library of Congress better than ever! Standards alignment! Web 2.0 tools! (and some other great stuff)

The Library of Congress has always had great lesson plans for social studies teachers.  And now all those incredible goodies are sporting new duds. The LOC has updated its teacher page and added a couple of really nice features.

The lessons, all developed by teachers and tested in classrooms, now have a more consistent structure and a streamlined new look. Plus the LOC has made it easier to find useful lessons and share those lessons with others.

Searching by Standards

Users can now search all of the Library’s classroom materials by state standard. Teachers simply select their grade level, state, and subject taught to discover which of the Library’s classroom materials (primary source sets, lesson plans, Collection Connections, presentations, and activities) meet the relevant standards.  In addition, each individual teacher resource will have a link that will show which standards it meets.

Very sweet!

Sharing Resources

It’s now easier for teachers to share and save their favorite Library of Congress teacher resources. Every item on the Library’s site features a sharing toolbar that lets teachers quickly and easily share or bookmark that item via more than ten different Web 2.0 tools including Facebook, Twitter and Delicious.

My favorite is the ability to quick save what you find to the very cool myLOC site. The myLOC is the Library’s way of allowing you to keep all of your LOC stuff in one place.

This toolbar also provides easy ways to save, e-mail, print and embed links in web sites.

RSS Features

The Library has been very active in finding ways to connect via social media / networks. You can check out all kinds of goodness at their YouTube site, Facebook, Flickr and iTunes U. You can also stay connected via their very nice RSS feeds by clicking any of the Subscribe buttons located throughout the site.

The Library of Congress site for teachers has always been a no-brainer because of its wonderful content. And now, it’s even easier and faster to use.

NCSS 2010 presentation – iPads & iPods in the Social Studies Classroom

Two hours wasn’t enough time.

The eight to ten a.m. presentation spot on Sunday morning at any conference is never a good time if you’re hoping for big attendance numbers. But it’s a great time if you’re hoping for really engaging conversation.

That’s cause only those really interested and ready to participate get up that early.

So I was looking forward to last Sunday’s session at the National Council for the Social Studies conference to facilitate a discussion on how to incorporate iPods and iPads into Social Studies classrooms. I wanted to hear what other teachers were doing, to share apps and to exchange tips and tricks.

And it went great. About 50 teachers showed up and we had some powerful conversations about why and how mobile devices should be integrated into Social Studies instruction. Teachers exchanged instructional strategies and different apps. We discussed potential problems and places to purchase third-party peripherals. And then we ran out of time.

A quick review?

• It’s not about the technology – it’s about preparing kids to be creative, open-minded problem solvers
• Our kids have to “power down” when they cross into the school zone
• Mobile devices like iPods, iPads and cell phones can help engage kids in thinking
• Shmoop apps are great for review
• GoodReader makes document transfer easy
• eClickr Host is awesome
• There are lots of cool primary document apps
• Take advantage of current Apple app policy
• Create a practical usage policy
• Buy non-Apple accessories
• Create your iTunes account without a credit card
• Use the settings feature to control access
• Use lanyards attached to covers with iPods
• The smaller hard drive iPod & iPad is probably big enough

There was more but you get the idea. What do you have to share? I would love to hear what apps you use and what tips / tricks work for you!

In case you’re curious, I’ve pasted the preso below: