Monday, January 26, 2015

Measure Me by the Unwritten Curriculum, Not My Test Scores

     There are many teachers and school personnel that tell  you that not all schools and students are numbers crunched by data and are treated like cookies coming from the oven. Teachers in the same building have gifted, special needs and certainly diverse learners in their room. One teacher may specialize in problem students and another may excel with a different type of student. The story below shows one teachers story with the test score process and gives a few thoughts to consider.  

Reed Gillespie | January 25, 2015 | 
via: gemnyc.org
As a lifelong educator, I’d like to believe that all teachers and administrators understand that we can’t use standardized test scores to measure teacher effectiveness. So, I was shocked the other day when an educator, one I think highly of, used test scores to compare two teachers’ effectiveness.
All of teacher A’s students passed the standardized test. Teacher B’s students didn’t fair as well, but teacher B’s classes were filled with special education students, rule breakers and fence-riders (those students who are easily swayed by their peers).
As a teacher, I loved teaching the most challenging students, so I was taken aback by this educator’s dubious claim. If he were to look at my standardized test scores, would he think any less of me as a teacher?
When you teach challenging students, the state-mandated curriculum must not be ignored, but often it should take a back seat to the unwritten curriculum. Comparatively, the standard curriculum is easy to teach. If test scores were my primary concern, when a student misbehaved, I could have simply stated, “John, do the work or get a referral.” I then could return to teaching the mandated curriculum. In that scenario, my students’ test scores may have been higher.
In addition to curriculum, though, we need to teach life skills, to build trusting relationships with all students and to help students learn from their errors (both academic and behavioral).
Teaching the unwritten curriculum includes no absolutes. Every decision is complex and impacts heavily on all learners. Instead of focusing solely on test scores, educators must also teach with empathy and work diligently to never leave a student behind.
Test scores cannot measure these attributes. Teacher effectiveness can only be marginally reflected in the scores of our students.
So, when evaluating my worthiness as a teacher, please, measure me by the unwritten curriculum, not my test scores.

My Twitter profile

Reed Gillespie

Reed is a longtime educator and coach, who is passionate about progressive learning and 21st-century assessment practices. Read more of his work here. "I'm a co-moderator of #VAchat, a Twitter conversation for Virginia (and non-Virginian) educators that meets Monday's at 8 ET. Most importantly, I'm a husband and father of four wonderful children and a grandchild. In my free time, I enjoy cooking, reading, sports and, of course, spending time with family."
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Saturday, January 24, 2015

Other Data: 20 Signs You’re Actually Making A Difference As A Teacher


    Some ways teachers and administrators make a difference as a teacher are very evident and an educator receives instant gratification. A student tells you you are their favorite teacher and you see their growth and sparkle in their eye make you very happy. But some of the following ideas are notions that are intrinsic that you notice about yourself without the compliments of anyone and others happen when your colleagues or students start to practice and seek you out for a list that is twenty great items but there could always be more added. See how many of the twenty you have noticed about yourself in the last school year. I bet you notice that you are making a difference and should put a bounce in your step.


Other Data: 20 Signs You’re Actually Making A Difference As A Teacher
by Saga Briggs, opencolleges.edu.au
You plan. You assess. You network. You collaborate.
You tweet, differentiate, administer literacy probes, scour 504s and IEPs, use technology, and inspire thinking.
And for all of this, you’re given bar graphs on tests to show if what you’re doing is actually making a difference. But there are other data points you should consider as well.
20 Signs You’re Actually Making A Difference As A Teacher
1. Your students are asking questions, not just giving answers.
Critical thinking does not mean thinking harder before giving an answer. It means being critical of all possible answers. If your students are asking more questions, and feel comfortable doing so, you can rest assured they will continue the habit outside your class.
2. You have used your authoritative role for inspiration, not intimidation. 
Monkey see, monkey do. I once had a writing professor who, as a best-selling novelist, was not too proud to bring his own raw material to class for the students to workshop. This was a great lesson in humility that I’ll never forget.
3. You have listened as often as you have lectured. Another lesson in authority.
Your students have respected your thoughts and ideas by attending your class; the least you can do is respect theirs. Lending an ear is the ultimate form of empowerment.
4. Your shy students start participating more often without being prompted.
Cold-calling may keep students on their toes, but it never creates an atmosphere of collaboration and respect. When the quiet ones feel comfortable enough to participate on their own, you know you’ve made an impact.
5. A student you’ve encouraged creates something new with her talents.
The simple act of creating is so personal, memorable, and gratifying that you can rest assured your student will want to make it a habit.
6. You’ve been told by a student that, because of something you showed them, they enjoy learning outside of class.
Even if it becomes a short-lived interest, your student will realize that learning outside of class doesn’t have to mean doing homework.

To read the rest, please click on the link below for these and other great stories
http://www.teachthought.com/teaching/other-data-20-signs-youre-actually-making-a-difference-as-a-teacher/

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Friday, January 23, 2015

WHAT ARE YOUR APPS SHARING ABOUT YOU ?

WHAT ARE YOUR APPS SHARING ABOUT YOU ?
The season of giving never ends for smartphone users. We’re giving out names, addresses, contacts, sensitive photos, our shopping habits and even our location to apps we’ve downloaded and websites we’ve visited. Gary Miliefsky, founder of Snoopwall, a “counterveillance” (a merger of counter and surveillance) software company in Nashua, N.H., says consumers should get their heads out of the cloud and start thinking about protecting their privacy on mobile devices and laptops.
BY KEVIN HUNT THE HARTFORD COURNT

TBL: Do people realize how much information they’re giving away when they download an app?

A: Let me ask you a question: How many apps do you have on your smartphone? (About 40.) There you go. We all have about 40 or 50 apps. I don’t know why people have given away their privacy, their security and their safety for free apps and convenience.

But nobody checks the app vendor’s website, nobody sends an email to their support team to say, “Are you real? Where are you located? How come I can’t find your phone number?”

I’ve had arguments with people where they’ve literally had cognitive dissonance and they will argue till they’re blue in the face that there’s no way a free flashlight app is spying on them, especially for another government. We’ve defiled the source code and we do packet-traces to China. It’s just crazy.

TBL: It’s the third-party flashlight apps that are a problem.

A: The built-in iPhone flashlight is a widget, part of the operating system in a way. So, yes, the built-in flashlight app is safe, I would assume. It’s the third-party flashlight apps. There are 500 in the iTunes store.

I was on Wall Street with a guy who said, “There’s no way my iPhone isn’t safe.” I said, ‘Do you have any third-party flashlight apps?’”

Guess which one he has? Surpax, No. 1: The worst piece of malware in the world.

TBL: What will happen if he leaves it on his phone?

A: On an iPhone, you’re not being eavesdropped on until you run the app. On an Android, if you download the second-most popular flashlight app, Brightest Flashlight from GoldenShores Technologies, it turns your light on without your permission, loads their privacy policy over the Internet

— which means it’s taking an Internet connection without your permission — and it brings up 25 pages of crap saying, “I’m eavesdropping on you, I’m geolocating you, I’m spying on you,” so that they’ve complied with the FTC ruling (a 2013 settlement over privacy violations).

And if you hit ‘accept,’ you’re in trouble. If you don’t hit accept and just cancel and close, it’s still running in the background! What am I missing?

TBL: Most apps do this. Why is it allowed?

A: Are you ready for the industry’s dirty little secret? Google, Apple, Microsoft Phone, Blackberry — all these devices have tool kits for developers to make apps that make money. The tool kits include the ability to turn on all the ports — hardware input/output ports, GPS, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, NFC, microphone — you’ve literally created a spyware developer’s kit to monetize advertising networks. That’s the dirty little secret.

TBL: So you’re recommending people go from 40 apps down to the essential eight, nine or 10?

A: Yes.

TBL: How should people approach passwords?

A: Would you ever use an exclamation or a dollar sign? Or a zero instead of an O? Or a three instead of an E? If you just do that — you take the same password you’re using today and you add some different characters, the chances it will be exploited from a brute-force attack go down dramatically. TBL: You recommend people change their passwords often. That doesn’t happen.

A: Look at the Sony Pictures (hack), how many passwords (revealed) were simple passwords. It’s crazy.

TBL: You seem to think the Sony hack is a “Revenge of the Nerd” thing by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un because of the studio’s film, “The Interview.” Still believe that?

A: Yes. Call me a geek with a personality, but the guys I know at Norse (the cybersecurity firm) track all the packets but they don’t have a personality. They say, “I’ve traced the packet and it’s a former Sony employee. He did it!” Just because there are some packets hitting Sony from this guy’s house doesn’t mean that he did it. In fact, if you want to misdirect people, you’re going to do things to throw some cookie crumbs out there. The North Korean cyberarmy is very smart. I have a lot of data that tells me this is a North Korean act, even if it gets tracked from coming down through Japan or a server in South Korea.

TBL: What about Facebook?

A: Business people should be thinking about Facebook as a social media tool. But for consumers, I would call Facebook creepware. Messenger is creepware. You give up privacy for convenience: Hey, I want to tell my 2,000 friends that I’ve never met that I just had a cheeseburger.

TBL: Uber?

A: I trust Uber. I do know Uber is spying on me in a way. My only fear, of course, is they’ve got my credit card, they’ve got a lot of info. Their back-end cloud database is going to be hacked by criminals in China or India or Brazil or Russia or some other country at some point soon.

TBL: It seems as if every site you visit is tracking what you do.

A: Yes. I would call AdChoices (a program ostensibly designed to protect users’ privacy) malware, but they would tell you they’re a smart monetizing business model. Let’s say you’re visiting your relatives for Thanksgiving and they don’t even know you have a dog and you’re at their house and you log in and check your Gmail.

Then you type in Google search, “organic dog food.” Then you go on your Android smartphone and the next ad you see is going to be Blue dog food on sale at Petco. You’re going to say, “Wow, I didn’t even know they could predict I was thinking of going to Petco right now. Why is this on my smartphone — I’m not even on my relative’s computer.” That’s how bad it is.
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Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Yes, one bullied student can transform a school out of simple consistent act of kindness

     In what I would call one of the most inspiring stories about a bullied student using one simple consistent act of kindness on a daily basis shows what one person can do to change the culture of their school. You will be totally inspired by this young man who went from invisible and ignored to a person that transformed his entire school in a way that rippled across the school community. Josh is a student who had no expectations of his act but to those who have come in contact with him, they feel like also can make a difference. This short video will blow you away.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?x-yt-cl=84359240&x-yt-ts=1421782839&v=PIHtuKc3Gjg#t=19
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10 Educators On Twitter You Should Follow (But Probably Don’t)

One of the best things about Twitter is the collegiality of Twitter. Learning from your colleagues is awesome at school meetings and you can make a laboratory of which works and which does not. When you add that to world class educators who make themselves and best practices to educators, great teaching and great learning for our students occur. I did an inventory (I did not know I should have one) and found out I follow two. I quickly added the other eight. The list is from about 19 months ago so it could be dated but here are their profiles and why should give them a go. Let me know if youdo.
,
If you’re already a teacher on Twitter, you know how useful it can be to connect with other educators and get the latest news in education.
If you’re not on Twitter you may think it’s just celebrities navel gazing while everyone else tweets pictures of their latest meal. Yes, there can be some of that, but there are also plenty of innovative teachers using Twitter to engage with like-minded people on a variety of education subjects.
twitter-in-the-classroomWhether you’re a Twitter novice or pro, here are some educators on Twitter that may be worth following.
10 Educators On Twitter You Should Follow (But Probably Don’t)
Middle school teacher Ron Clark, winner of Disney’s American Teacher Awards 2000 Outstanding Teacher of the Year, is also an author, speaker and co-founder of the Ron Clark Academy. Located in Atlanta, the RCA is dedicated to teaching in innovative, creative and inspiring ways. Clark’s Twitter feed offers frequent tweets, including lots of photos featuring daily and special events at the school. Followers can look forward to at least one tweet a day, and usually more, of Clark’s inspiring insight and updates into his dynamic and busy life.
Recognized as one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People, Kopp is CEO and co-founder of Teach For All and founder and chair of the board for Teach For America, both of which are dedicated to providing excellent education for children in low-income communities and in impoverished areas throughout the world. Via her Twitter feed, Kopp offers encouraging words, travel and personal updates, photos, and links to articles, films and other things of interest.
Prolific Twitter user Jessica Johnson is an elementary school principal in rural Wisconsin and co-moderator of the #educoach Wednesday night chat on Twitter. As a matter of fact, she lists “Twitter Evangelist” on her Twitter bio. As of last count, she has almost 7,400 followers and she’s closing in on 23,000 tweets. Johnson’s Twitter feed is a great place to learn more about #educoach and other education initiatives and groups on Twitter. Along with practical advice and useful links, Johnson offers a nice dose of humor to her tweets and engages in lively discussions with her followers.
Passionate educator and busy Twitter user Crista Anderson is a K-12 instructional coach in Montana. At almost 20,000 tweets and 4,500 followers, Anderson has a lot to say and a lot of people listening. She offers links to articles, conference information and updates, interesting studies, research, photos, reminders, advice, and valuable resources. Anderson is engaging and good at answering follower questions.
Rhode-Island based educator Nicole Bucka was formerly an English, special ed, and ELL teacher in Southern California and is currently RTI support for secondary schools in Rhode Island. She is an autism advocate and her tweets include links and resources related to autism and special ed. She also discusses student discipline, student success, and year round schooling as it impacts student learning.
Texas instructional technology guru, writer, speaker, and Google Certified Teacher Amy Mayer is passionate about edtech and a prolific Twitter user. Followers of Mayer’s are treated to a mixed bag of tweets which have included links to job openings, edtech advice, cool videos, useful links and more. Mayer seems determined to show how technology and creativity can go hand in hand where education is concerned.
Fourth-grade teacher and edtech enthusiast Scott Newcomb seems to constantly scan the net for great links and useful information on topics ranging from mobile learning technology to project-based learning, which he then tweets to his many followers. Followers will find tons of leads on great iPad education apps and savvy tips for teachers who want to engage in mobile learning in their own classrooms.
Josh Stumpenhorst is a sxith-grade language arts and social science teacher at Lincoln Junior High School in Illinois and the state’s 2012 teacher of the year. His Twitter feed offers inspiration, humor, and practical teaching tips. He is an avid Twitter user who feels Twitter has profoundly affected his life, evidenced by his over 40,000 tweets. Followers can expect at least a tweet an hour.
Fifth-grade teacher and creator of the Global Read Aloud Pernille Ripp writes that she has received no awards or accolades except for “the lightbulbs that go off in my students’ heads every day.” This is an educator who is in the trenches, every day, in her classroom in Madison, Wis., and tweets about that and other education subject on her busy Twitter feed as she engages with her followers.
Vicki Davis is a busy education voice on social media. Along with her bustling Twitter feed, which has more than 54,000 followers, she is a full-time teacher and IT director at her school, and she is a writer of both a book and a blog. She tweets on personal development, teaching, leadership and more while keeping followers informed about her speaking engagements and newest podcasts.
If you’re looking for even more K-12 or higher-ed educators to follow on Twitter, want to join in on an education chat, or just want to see what people are saying about education, you can do searches of hashtags such as #edchat, #edtech, #elemchat, #education, #teaching and more.
Kristin Marino writes about education and social media. She has an English degree from the University of Nevada, Reno; image attribution flickr user hankerstein

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Tuesday, January 20, 2015

What If Every Teacher Tweeted


    


     Think of the possibilities. Talking to other teachers about best practices is a great thing within your building. When you add the world wide web, ideas that would never happen because you would never meet the other educator would now be the norm. Without a doubt, since I started tweeting in December as a member of the Vanguard team in my school district which promotes technology and best practices using this medium within the schools, I have had many great ideas including reading the story below. If you are not tweeting, you should at least with your colleagues. It should take your teaching to a whole new level.

What If Every Teacher Tweeted

What If Every Teacher Tweeted? Why Teachers Should Tweet
by Terry Heick
What if every teacher tweeted?
Is there some kind of sequence of events we might expect? A teacher signs up for twitter after agonizing over the details (username, avatar, bio, etc.), follows a few dozen people, then sits slack-jawed and confused as that non-stop digital stream begins.
We have to assume that somehow this trickles down to the learning experiences of the students–their writing, their skills, and the wandering of their thoughts–yes? No reason to tweet just to be all avant-garde about it all. It depends on how it’s used–twitter, that is.
Like any tool, twitter is designed for a task. The results of that task depends on the knowledge and skill of its user. There is nothing other-wordly about twitter, if we’re being honest. It has its talents (a few of which we looked at in why twitter works in education), but it is, in shorty, some thing some one made.
And as teachers, we can use it, or leave it alone.
Twitter’s Magic Mix

In spite of its popularity (500 million tweets per day from 271 million active users–almost 80% outside of the United States), most teachers don’t tweet. I mean, I don’t have data in front of me that says that, but judging from the schools that I visit, I’d put the number of teachers that actively use twitter–well, a very small number.
In lieu of the pleadings from colleagues to “connect,” most teachers don’t use twitter, but are quite satisfied with facebook, thank you very much. And certainly facebook connects. As does instagram, tumblr, wikis, blogging, Google+, linkedin, pinterest, YouTube, et. al. It’s an exhausting list, but there is something about twitter that is both disarming and imminently useful at the same time.
A small handful of buttons, a simple interface that rarely changes, and a general humility about itself. It’s not seeking to replace the internet (as is Zuckerberg’s project). It’s just twitter–a just right mix of engagement, accessibility, and utility. There’s something addicting about that stream of tweets that fall down your timeline as the ideas and messages and energy materialize, and then fall away. You can lurk, you can troll, you can be snarky, or you can be informative.
So what if every teacher tweeted? What might happen? What could we assume? If every teacher tweeted, we could assume that…
…They found a voice
Ideally, we’d see that every teacher had found their voice. Just like every teacher must somehow translate their knowledge and personality into some kind of “voice” and personality in the classroom as a learning leader, it’s not much different on twitter. What can I say, as a teacher, on twitter that other people will find compelling? Useful?
This is something I actually struggle with. I’m far more comfortable writing books, essays, and blog posts that I am tweets–which is why I don’t tweet often. When I do find the “courage to tweet,” it happens by realizing that I’m not “great” on twitter, and tweeting anyway.
They connected
If every teacher tweets, we can someone that they connected to someone for some reason without getting stuck in a loop of “lurking and liking.”
Unless they are sending messages to absolutely no one with zero audience awareness, social skills, or will to understand this digital contraption, a teacher that tweets naturally connects–some more, some less, but connecting is a natural consequence of communication. It’ll happen, and who knows where those connections can lead?
They started a global PLN
Add that one to the resume. You want to teach and think differently? Connect with teachers from all over the world as they seek to understand their craft, and socialize that process through twitter.
Felt peer pressure
If every teacher tweeted, somewhere along the line they’d feel peer pressure. To belong. To be accepted. To be popular. To fit in. To be retweeted, favorited, and followed. High school all over again. Even the ones that act above it care, or they wouldn’t be on twitter to begin with.
Were heard
If they tweeted, they’d be heard. Maybe by only a handful of people–especially at first. But if you’re among the schools on this “leader in me” kick, there are few better ways to jump-start leadership than by finding a niche, connecting with others, and doing good work.
And being heard can help quiet the nerves–and the urge to be overly-defensive and argue and cross your arms over your chest with your chin in the air. If every teacher connected, felt heard, and had a place they felt they “fit in,” maybe so many wouldn’t quit.
Stay calm and tweet.
Considered other ideas
Unless they only follow people that think exactly like they do, and then know every single thing that similarly-thinking person knows, at one time or another, every teacher that tweets will be forced to consider ideas other than their own–and likely in privacy, where they may not feel compelled to be argumentative and close-minded about it all. And that can be powerful unless they’re so thick-headed that not even tweets can get in.
There were a lot of bad tweets
And if every teacher tweeted, we can assume there were a lot of bad tweets. Just being honest. Think about it. *shudder*
They found a niche
Every teacher that tweets will hopefully do some for a reasons above and beyond “getting followers.” While it’s true that followers mean reach, they don’t mean impact. There are an awful lot of twitter users with an awful lot of followers that say the same thing everyone else says, which gets them an awful lot more followers, but in pursuit of what? The same making more same. Blahblahblahblahblahblah.
Ask yourself instead, “What matters to me, and how can I use twitter to impact it?”
The formula for success for teachers on twitter might be simple, then. Find a niche, find a voice, and care a lot about it. That might be a good idea for a post of its own.
adpated image attribution flickr nwabr; Why Teachers Should Tweet
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Sunday, January 18, 2015

Special Education students connect aerospace and real life

     One of the great things about Twitter is there are so many great ideas out there that you pick up information you can use and be inspired by that you would never think of yourself. Philip Capobianco (@CapoOttawa) from I presume Ottawa, Canada tweeted this story out about a teacher doing an awesome technology program with his special eductionstudents. You will be impressed with his results. Think Stand and Deliver meets Top Gun only with his lucky students.

 

O'side students fly model planes

By 6 a.m.
 
Mark Nicholson, special needs teacher at Jefferson Middle School in Oceanside, retrieved a motorized glider that serves as the cornerstone to a program where he teaches students about aerospace principles.
Mark Nicholson, special needs teacher at Jefferson Middle School in Oceanside, retrieved a motorized glider that serves as the cornerstone to a program where he teaches students about aerospace principles. — Charlie Neuman
 
At Oceanside’s Jefferson Middle School, special-needs teacher and aviation buff Mark Nicholson is showing his students the ropes on how to fly a battery-powered glider — and that’s not all.
Nicholson is using Civil Air Patrol lessons that teach everything from aerodynamics and windsock construction to airplane anatomy and algebra concepts on radius and distance. He connects the theories taught in books and on computers to a real life application.
photo

Aerospace ed. for special needs kids

View Gallery
He hopes the program catches on with other teachers at the school, and that students might even get the chance to fly in a real plane if he garners enough support.
Some of Nicholson’s students have already said they want to become pilots one day.
“That’s what I want to be,” said seventh grader James Smith. “It’s better than playing a video game.” U.S. Air Force Maj. Thomas Scott, director of the Civil Air Patrol’s aerospace education California wing, said that Nicholson’s approach to teaching is unique in that he’s trying to incorporate the Patrol’s lesson plans at a school. The group’s approach is more typically found in after-school programs or clubs, Scott said.
“His way of integrating this into a special-needs program is something we’ve not seen before,” Scott said.
The Civil Air Patrol is a volunteer civilian auxiliary of the Air Force, and is tasked with search and rescue operations, aerospace education for youth, and cadet programs for teenagers.
The glider, instructional materials and software to simulate flying are part of a curriculum package provided by the Civil Aviation Patrol that the middle school purchased with a $720 grant from the Oceanside Chamber of Commerce.
The package includes other educational elements as well, including lessons on rocketry and robotics, for instance. On the drawing board are plans to build and fire off rockets, perhaps from a field behind the middle school.
While the glider program for his special needs students began just a few months ago, Nicholson plans to roll out a larger aerospace education program that would include all 650 students in Jefferson’s 6-8 grades.
Aviation is more than a pastime for Nicholson, who said he has been flying single-engine planes for nearly 30 years and expects to earn his wings to become a flight instructor in a few months.
Jefferson Principal Marie Higareda de Ochoa said the aerospace education program addresses “common core standards” by connecting concepts taught in her school’s math department with flying the glider.
“The proverbial question asked by eighth graders is, ‘Why do I have to learn algebra if it’s never used?’ Well, they learn it and have a culminating activity with the model airplane.’”
At the moment, the program has been structured around only Nicholson’s 19 special needs students.
Every Monday, before 8 a.m., seventh graders like James Smith and Alvaro Sabino look forward to the lessons.
First, they huddle around a computer to test fly a simulated glider plane. It’s all guided with software and a joy stick, just like a video game. The joy stick moves the rudder and ailerons to give the glider movement to the left or right, or a rise or fall in elevation.
 
To read the rest, click below. http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2015/jan/15/oceanside-teacher-educates-students-on-flying/2/?#article-copy
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