One of the weird things about blogging is that I simply can not predict what entries are going to hit home. I never would have thought that a simple and casual mentioning of a site I’d heard about for years would be one of them, but the RateMyTeacher post kicked up a storm!
The comment that I thought I’d mention here came from a primary teacher (their podcast) and blogger in South Wales, Paul Harrington. He asks an important question that I want to toss out. Harrington says,
…how can I a primary teacher in
South Wales who has been bitten by the bug of web 2.0 technology (podcasting and blogging plus using other IT across the curriculum)
spread this to my hard pressed colleagues – I have done some in-house
training and given demonstrations in house of what is possible – but
schools don’t move very fast to take up technology as staff have too
many other pressures on them. I am frustrated as I can see what they
could do with the technology – but it can be tiring being an evangelist
in the wilderness ( I approached my local Education IT Training Agency
– I don’t think that they understand web 2.0 !!!!! I may be wrong )
2 Cents Worth » Rate My Teachers
My first question is, “Have any of your teachers been rated on RateMyTeachers?” If so, don’t show them. They’ll freak. At this point, I’d just like to suggest some directions from which we need to tell this new story about teaching and learning in this digital, networked, and overwhelming time of rapid change.
- Stories from outside — stories from the world, for which we are making our children ready.
- Stories from within — stories about new technologies and their impact on learning.
- Stories from above — get administrative buy-in if you can. Be professional, but be persistent.
- Stories from below — tap into the kids’ conversations. Pay attention to them. Ask them what they do for fun and compare that with what we did for fun when we were eight, twelve, and sixteen. Make a case for how different these children are.
The advice I can’t resist giving at this point is for you to form a study group around modernizing classrooms in your locale. Find one or more teachers in each of your schools, especially going up into the middle and upper grades. Find fertile ground in all of your schools and then plan your siege. You need information and lots of ways to share it. Set up a computer in the teachers lounge and have a presentation running on it such as Karl Fisch’s “Did you Know” slide show or his more recent, “What If?“.
I think that you just need to get people talking. Invite the media in (though do this very carefully as sometimes notoriety can backfire). Figure out how to get parents other than yours to listen to the podcast.
That’s all I’m going to say here.Â
Other suggestions are requested.
technorati tags:warlick, technology, newstory
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You have to be extremely careful about inviting the media in. In many cases it is not allowed and could be a disciplinary offence.
I agree with much of what you say though. There is always the problem of early adopters vs the rest,and it really is a case of making haste slowly.
I agree with Terry here. There are usually channels for doing this. If your district or governing body has a community/schools coordinator or communications officer, that might be a good person to invite into your study group.
As part of our Sept. parent night, we showed a series of movies highlighting our school and their children. We have offered to burn them their own copies. Reflecting on how we could have improved this process, we should have burned copies before the meeting and had them ready for the parents. They were so impressed with all the cool activities and learning projects their children had been doing in class, the parents requested another family night. Our principal suggested a technology and arts night.
So, when we have our technology/art night, we will have our students create a short podcast with their parents. We have parents that contact us and want copies of their child’s podcast to send to relatives. Our tech department purchased a multi disc copier. Our school buys bulk CDs and DVD. This helps us bridge the “digital divide’s” issue of lack of Internet access. Most homes seem to have CD players and or DVDs.
David thanks for airing my point it is great to finally get some sort of response – it takes away slightly the feeling of – ‘ is it me?’
The advice is very interesting re: how to advance new technology into the school and district ( cluster groups of schools ) I like blakej’s ideas of ways to build in new technologies by presenting them direct to the parents – by-passing the internel speed of change ( I did produce CD’s for my pupils with creative podcasts and dv films ). I take Dave’s suggestion of making haste slowly and/or tryng to link up with someone else in the area ( I did put a shout out and got one reply from a newly qualified teacher in a High School ) – it is however frustrating when you can see what you would like to do but things are moving so slowly – possibly accentuating the digital divide for our pupils – which would be doing them a diservice- and disadvantaging them in this ‘modern fast moving’ technological world – enough of being John the Baptist where oh where is Jesus ?
I think that Kathy Sierra’s latest post has some oblique relevance here. http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/09/why_they_dont_u.html
Having to adopt tools that mean going back to the “I suck” point can be both demotivating and time consuming. It becomes easier to play the “I don’t have time card”. And it is true that UK (I don’t know about anywhere else) teachers have so much on their plates nowadays, that it is difficult to make the time to aquire confidence with new kit.
It is also very easy to fall back on “the tried and tested methods still do the job”.
I can relate to the heartfelt cry at the end of Paul Harrington’s comment on many levels. And that line of thought has got my hamsters going in their wheels – the parallel can be taken further: when Jesus came, not everyone recognised him, and those who did were persecuted and pilloried. Sound familiar?
David…
Having been the focus of a positive review in a similar site. I will refrain from sharing the site, but if you need to know I will tell you via email. I have to say that I fear that these types of outlets result in fear, rumor and innuendo mongering. Heck…. my positive remarks resulted in many of my international friends saying things like, “I heard some nice things about you….” This, of course is nice but, what is the basis of all this? Not much! It is nice to have some hard work recognized, but I would rather have had a personal email or note!
When did we get to the point when we had to rely on hearsay and rumors when actual, real and profound data make the difference. The axe-grinders out there have a real advantage and the “less-than-savvy” net-surfers will dive right in!
Yes Karynr you are quite right that he was persecuted when he arrived and obviously didn’t survive to see his vision flourish – I hope that history doesn’t repeat itself this time !!!! Let the Geek inherit the Earth !!!
There is hope I have had messages of support and welcome from several podcasters and bloggers ‘out there in the blogosphere’ since making my heartfelt plea…
Hi David,
A good question ….
Show people how Web2.0 stuff can make their lives – professional and personal – better. People need motivation …. blogs, Del.icio.us, aggregators, wikis, etc are all new learning for educators. However once people get their heads around them they DO make your life easier. I love the way I can ‘hook into’ the learning and thinking of people all around the world.
We have just finished the ULearn conference here in New Zealand and Web2.0 apps were a strong feature of what we have been doing. I ran a session on some of these tools and once people saw the potential to make their classrooms more exciting places, and particularly the way they could add significantly to their professional learning the hour and a half was WAY too short.
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