The Future of Education & The Future of School Are on Very Different Paths

A few weeks ago I posted this passing thought on Twitter that I was not quite ready to come back to at the time but seemed to get a little traction:

@anderscj
anderscjDoes anyone else get the feeling that the future of education & the future of school are on very different paths. 20 days ago via Mobile Web · powered by @socialditto

Then, last night as I was about to finish reading Larry Cuban's (2001) Oversold and Underused: Computers in the Classroom Jerrid Kruse asked me this question on Twitter:

@jerridkruse
Jerrid Kruse@anderscj you liking cuban's work? 15 hours ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto

to which I replied:

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse I wouldn't say I like it so much as I agree with most of it. 15 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse Cuban presents an inconvenient truth. 15 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

Cuban basically explains why, despite unprecedented access to technology, such reforms have failed to make foundational changes in schools. In Cuban's account the reasons for such high investment in tech tools in schools has been: 1. To make students more digitally literate, and 2. To shift from a teacher-centric to a student-centered learning environment. In his account he lists numerous teachers and programs that do this but shows how they are not the norm. What these tools end up doing is reinforcing already established teaching practices instead of transforming them. Among the many explanations he gives he includes school heritage, public conceptions, flawed decision-making, conflicting policy, and reformer misunderstanding of the purpose of school.

Before reading this book I thought Larry Cuban and Seymour Papert were on opposite ends of the ideological spectrum, Papert a tech-enthusiast and Cuban who near the end of this book calls for schools to cease spending money on computers:

"Contemporary reformers have forgotten the democratic mission at the heart of public schooling, ignored the critical importance of social capital in strengthening civic behaviors, and proven too narrowly committed to technocratic solutions of school problems—all of which tempts me to call for a moratorium on buying any more computers for K-12 schools." Cuban

But now I realize they are closer to being on the same page than I thought. Reading between the lines on these pages it is obvious that the kind of transformation, the kind of change in the classroom that Cuban was hoping to find was akin to the kind of constructionist tech-enhanced project-based learning Papert observed with children in their use of LOGO to learn math. But, what he found was no such transformation on any measurable scale.

One thing Cuban hints at but doesn't give much weight to are the places where computer technology has revolutionized learning. He recognizes that the places where teachers and professors most use technology is in preparing for lessons and that students who knew a lot about computers learned most about them at home or in a part-time job. These are places where the personal computer has been used as a personal learning device, where the learning supports the learner's own goals and not the goals set forth by a teacher or curriculum. The technology-enhanced learning revolution has happened, its just left schools behind.

So, lets explore a few examples of this. First, how many teachers who engage in "PLNs" say that they find their social media engagement with other educators more valuable than the school or district-sponsored professional development programs? It is odd for a day to go by without me seeing at least one Tweet expressing this sentiment. A quick search in Twitter for "PLN," "Love," and "PD" drew these responses:

@ccampbel14
Cathy Campbell@wrice1978 I use Twitter for daily learning & connecting with global educators. I love my math PLN that spans the globe! #sfssepsb 5 hours ago via TweetGrid.com · powered by @socialditto

@BobToms100
BobTomsI love my PLN, esp. during #ukedchat I will try my best here, esp. against the odds. Education & needs is not fully understood by many here. 5 days ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto

@CTuckerEnglish
Catlin TuckerLet's use PD as an opportunity to talk to teachers about how to develop their own PLN to keep the learning happening all year. #edchat 4 hours ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto

@thereadingzone
Sarah Thanks to Twitter I have made some amazing friends and my PLN is ever-growing. I learn more on Twitter than from any PD I pay for... 2 days ago via web · powered by @socialditto

@1olballcoach
Jon KrugThanks to all the tweets! Have new "converts" to the world of twitter and its PD and PLN uses! Good Stuff! #sschat #psychat 6 days ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto

@Akee123
Rob AckermanDoes anyone have a sample certificate of completion for a teacher participating in a PLN? Our district is exploring this PD option #edchat 7 days ago via Twitter for iPad · powered by @socialditto

Also, one could look at the rise in homeschooling and unschooling as a result of greater access to personal learning tools at home. Its not that computers and the Internet cause homeschooling, unschooling, and dropouts, it just enables and empowers them to feel this is a viable choice. I have spoken with many families over the past two years who have cited how important the Internet is for their homeschooling and unschooling. And this is not to say that the Internet can do what a teacher can't. Many unschoolers hire teachers when they feel they need them. The technology does not replace teachers, it makes it possible to do away with school and empower students to take control of their own learning.


Regardless of whether you believe Digital Natives and Immigrants exist or not I think Marc Prensky accurately illustrates the problem in this video:

"Education has biforcated completely into school where you get a credential and its about the past and and after school where you really learn interesting stuff on your own." Prensky

And Sugata Mitra proposes a plausible role of learning and schooling in this video:


Perhaps this is also why when asked last year about how social media and mobile technologies are changing teaching and learning in schools S. Craig Watkins said he and his colleagues at the Digital Youth Project are more interested in studying how students are using these tools at home.

Now take examples of teachers who work in what John Holt would term S-chools who have managed to transform teaching and learning with technology in their classrooms. How many of them have done so by deschooling their classrooms? I think Clay Burrell, who often talks with distaste about schooly things, is an excellent example:

Part 1---------Part 2

(This presentation requires Microsoft Silverlight. Click here to install.

It seems pretty obvious to me that in order to achieve the kind of learning revolution in schools that computer technology "reformers" sought that teachers must deschool their classrooms. But, to do so teachers bump up against a wall that Cuban doesn't mention in his book but a commenter on Scott McLeod's blog touches on. Sam Fancera writes:

Scott – Many of us don’t do this on a large scale, because many of us are evaluated solely on our students standardized test results. I agree that we should emphasize hands-on inquiry, critical thinking, and collaboration, but until the reliance on test scores for evaluative purposes are modified we will not make a full press.

I would take this a step further and say that it is not just the evaluation based on test scores that is the problem but many of us are also evaluated on how well we follow a teaching routine set forth for us by our schools. In my current school we are obligated to use the workshop model of 10-15 minutes direct instruction followed by 20-30 minutes of individual or group work ending with a 5-10 minute closing. This alone hinders the kind of learning that technology can enhance because it sets up the teacher as the one who controls the classroom curriculum, who asks the questions, and who tells students what they should do with their 20-30 minutes in-between. Even if this expectation were not explicitly stated, as it had never been in any of the other schools I worked in, it is always implied. I have yet to have an administrator I work for who understands the kind of learning that can occur when you allow this kind of transformation to take place. And, even if I did work for an administrator who understood, the expectations carried by past administrators and classroom evaluators is enough to shock me back into traditional teaching mode.

Yesterday I wrote this comment on McLeod's blog that I think I will repost here because it more clearly describes this problem:

Shelley Owen Reply January 6, 2012 at 7:56 am

My son, a high school senior reading this right next to me, says, “Right on! This is so true.” He is no slacker at school; his grades are excellent. However, we both know how little he really has to do to score well on any test. It’s almost laughable.

Carl Anderson Reply January 9, 2012 at 4:12 pm

Shelley,

What is more laughable is how little tests can really measure. But what brings me to tears is the weight we are forced to put on something which means so little. And what drives me crazy is having to defend over and over again how ignoring the tests and focusing on personally meaningful projects leads to better learning, is more rigorous, and ultimately will lead to better test scores. And what drives me absolutely stark raving mad is trying to explain to school managers (and often to other teachers) that such authentic learning is the result of negotiation and dialog with the learner and cannot be done through pre-planned scripted lessons or teacher-driven assessments.

A teacher’s job ought to be to help children learn. Instead, too often, the teacher’s job performance is assessed not only on how well students perform on a test that narrowly measures what a student knows but also on how closely they follow a script and stick to their lesson plans. If the goal is optimal learning then the very best teachers know their lessons cannot be scripted, they cannot be pre-written, they cannot be programmed. The optimal lesson plan is one that is written on-the-fly and responds to student needs and questions, not some common core standardized curriculum that dictates what and when each student should learn certain things.

In my classroom I ask very few questions. I make my students do most of the asking. Their questions guide what we do in class and what we learn. They ask the questions they are ready to wrestle with and are relevant to them at the time they are ready to have them answered. If the curriculum is truly important the student’s questions will lead us to it. Usually it does. Aside from that I load their environment, both physical and digital, with enough curiosities to spark the kinds of questions I would hope they would ask. The questions I ask most frequently are, “What do you want to learn about?” and “How can I help you today?” But, justifying this methodology to school managers who see learning as synonymous with knowledge and knowledge as something that can be handed down from teacher to student as if they were empty vessels waiting to be filled is hard if not impossible. Consequently, I often get comments when observed like, “I don’t understand what is going on here but I wouldn’t ask you to change it.” to “what you are doing is incredible but you need to work on….” and then they hand me the Charlotte Danielson rubric clearly outlining the things they didn’t observe in my class. I’ve come to realize that very few people in charge of most schools and most departments of education know much about how people actually learn. We are required to post our lesson objectives on the board. Mine always reads: Students will set their own goals and work toward achieving them. And those two students playing video games in the corner, they made those games but did anyone who came to observe bother to ask?

I am starting to wonder how much longer I can find a place in this profession where I can do what I do. But then what we assess today isn’t doing anyway. Doing and do-ers are on the way out. How many industrial technology, family and consumer science, art, music, drama, creative writing, poetry, graphic design, and computer programming courses are there anymore? Where they do exist they exist as places where students mostly study others doing, not doing themselves. We don’t want doers, we want consumers. We can pay workers in China $150/month to do our doing. At least if the students do well on that standardized test we will know that they have consumed the curriculum and objectives someone else set for them.

My conversation with Jerrid last night ended this way:

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse Cuban presents an inconvenient truth. 17 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

@jerridkruse
Jerrid Kruse@anderscj yes, IMO he & postman Make clear that tech simply doesn't matter, teaching/teachers do. 17 hours ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse technology may in some ways improve learning but mostly as personal tools...to improve unstructured learning, not schooling. 17 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse Cuban, for me, supports my building hypothesis that the tech-enhanced learning renaissance is leaving schools behind.... 17 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

@jerridkruse
Jerrid Kruse@anderscj can you explain that hypothesis? 17 hours ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse technology may in some ways improve learning but mostly as personal tools...to improve unstructured learning, not schooling. 17 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse tech helps us learn things better we normally wouldn't go to school to learn 17 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

@jerridkruse
Jerrid Kruse@anderscj that makes a lot of sense. 17 hours ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse and for those who are able, tech helps those who want to learn on their own and in their own way 17 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

@jerridkruse
Jerrid Kruse@anderscj able & have means. 17 hours ago via Twitter for iPhone · powered by @socialditto

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse yes. And those teachers who have managed to allow tech transform tchng & lrng do so by deschooling their classrooms.... 17 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

@anderscj
anderscj@jerridkruse ....something those without means consistently say they don't want for their children. 17 hours ago via Twitterrific · powered by @socialditto

The Real Disruptive Innovation

This morning I listened to Kim Ross, principal of Minnesota's first online high school, give a keynote speech to a group of educators in Southeast Minnesota. I can't say that he said anything that we have not heard before. It was a good talk about how the world is changing and about how online education allows for teachers to individualize instruction and focus more on relationships with their students. He gave a general overview of the theory of disruptive innovation in education and drew special attention to how this individualization of instruction made possible by online learning was the disruptive force, not the technology.

In the past few years schools have been looking at online education as a major disruptive force. We have seen exponential growth in enrollment in online schools and as a result a lot of our traditional brick and mortars have seen a decline. It has been widely thought, and I must confess that for a long time I have counted myself among those holding this belief, that schools need to modify their programs to draw upon what is happening in online education to improve what they do and make instruction more individualized. In answer to this we have seen a slew of measures taken by traditional school systems in an attempt to capitalize on this theory and retain students. Many schools have tried offering their own online courses, others have invested heavily in technologies like interactive whiteboards with the thought that if only they made the presentation of class theatrics more visually appealing students would be more engaged, and other schools have experimented with hybrid courses which are primarily online courses augmented with periodic face to face meetings.

None of these solutions ever really felt right to me but I have only recently been able to make enough sense of what I have been thinking to articulate it. Perhaps the rise in enrollment in online schools has very little to do with the quality of education they offer and more to do with declining relevance of schools in general. I have noticed and I have spoken with many teachers who have observed that in the past few years student motivation to meet deadlines, to attain a good grade, and to complete all of their work has been on the decline. What worked to motivate students to "achieve" five years ago isn't working today for a large percentage of our students. "Its like they don't care if they pass my class."

What has changed in the past five years? What are kids doing today that they were not doing, or able to do before? What they are doing is learning. They are learning on their own in ways that were not really possible before. Through highly engaging Montessori-like online learning environments like YouTube, Flickr, fansite forums, Myspace, Facebook, etc. they are learning deeply about the things that interest them and are relevant to them. The scale has shifted to a point where the technologies available to learn deeply about anything online on your own has in large part outperformed what our school pedagogies and our school systems can compete with.

To illustrate this, take the following video as an example. What is this kid doing in this video? How is he using the technology to aid in his learning? Does he need school to help him learn? What is the broad implication of this? It is worth seeing this video on the YouTube page and reading through the comments he has received (click here).



Do online schools do this? No, not really, but what they do is offer a credential just like students can get at a traditional brick and mortar, only online allows a student to endure the arduous and tedious task of schooling at their own pace and in their own time. Online schools allow students the ability to let their own interest-driven learning to take a front seat and take top priority. The asynchronous nature of the majority of online instruction means that it is not getting in the way of the learning activities that are really meaningful to kids. It is not that online learning or individualized instruction in an online school are so much better than that which students receive face to face in a traditional brick and mortar, it is that online schools don't get in the way.

Weekly Tech Tips - Digital Natives, Peer Teaching, & Student Empowerment

Weekly Tech Tip:

Digital Natives, Peer Teaching, & Student Empowerment

Related Links:

• Here is Author Don Tapscott's Fantastic Talk from ASCD About "Growing Up Digital"

• Marc Prensky @ Handheld Learning 2008
• Confessions of a Converted Lecturer: Eric Mazur
• Prensky, Marc (2001). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants. UCB University Press.
• Prensky, Marc (2001). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, Part 2: Do they really think differently?. UCB University Press.
• Evidence Doesn't Support Generational Distinction by Mark Bullen on Net Gen Skeptic

Link Stew:

• Google Wave Dance by Mike Relm
• Culture, Politics & Pedagogy: A Conversation w/ Henry Giroux
• Unschooling Vs. Homeschooling Vs. Formal Education
• The Daily Show With John Stewart on Apple's Response to Gizmodo & The iPhone Prototype

• The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
  Appholes
  www.thedailyshow.com
  Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

• Imagine It! - New documentary with lots of people educators and edtech people will recognize including Gary Stager, Sir Ken Robinson, and Ray Kurzweil. Site includes many clips from the film.
• 
• Why and How to Give an Ignite Talk, Ep 19 - Scott Berkun
• Great List of Multiplatform Free Video Editing Tools
• Google Earth (as a web app)
• Parents using smartphones to entertain bored kids
• TitanPad - Another Etherpad Replacement
  
• @hrheingold Archive of today's webinar on critical thinking/web literacy http://iste.acrobat.com/p88815038/
• Socialbookmarking practices in the field of education : semantic, socio-cognitive and formative affordances
• New video game academy won't be child's play
• Web 2.0's Top 1,000 List!
• It Goes Both Ways By Bridget McCrea on The Journal
  
• Tal.ki http://tal.ki/ - embed a forum into your website.
• TextEd - Cellphone safety and etiquette curriculum
• ePubBud - Create and share children's books (like YouTube for children's literature)
• FriendorFollow - Twitter tool for managing your followers. Allows you to sort who you are following and who is following you with many options. (saved me hours of time last night)
• Game for science - Virtual world devoted to science, technology and free educational games online
• Kerpoof Studio - Make your own storybook
• Asustek Eee Pad to hit channel in July - said to run on Google Android
• How the Crowd Can Teach by Jon Dron & Terry Anderson
• u.nu :: the shortest urls. period.

Blog Carnival:

• Obama & State School Leaders Want Facebook Unblocked in Classrooms! by Gary Stager on Stager-to-Go
• Technology – Roadblock to reform? by Jerrid Kruse on Bridging the Gap
• Deal Or No Deal? by Tom Whitby on My Island View
• Anthony Orsini, Please Shut Up by Ira Socol on SpeEdChange
• Assessment is a Bad Word? by Ben Grey on The Edge of Tomorrow
• Assessement Options: A Rant by Nick Provenzano on The Nerdy Teacher
• A Radical Notion by Chris Lehman on Practical Theory
• It's Time to Tackle Minnesota's Achievement Gap by John Fitzgerald on MN2020
• State's K-12 Education Cuts Run Deep by Jeff Van Wychen on MN2020 [This post has some valuable and eye opening statistics about school funding in Minnesota]
• Standing By as State’s Education Infrastructure Crumbles by John Fitzgerald on MN2020
  
• Teachers, Tenure, Transformation by Ira Socol on SpeEd Change
• A Call for Education Equity by Marian Wright Edelman on Change.org
• Mapping the Filter: What do you Block? by Will Richardson on Weblogg-ed
  

Filling the Production Gap

PBS FRONTLINE's digital_nation is full of great clips and sound bytes. Addressed in that film by many of people interviewed as what Arne Duncan refers to as the "Opportunity Gap." This opportunity gap sounds very similar to what many of us are calling the "Production Gap." I have taken the important clips related to that topic from that documentary, added clips from a keynote speech by Alan November, interviews with Seymore Papert, and clips from old public domain ephemeral films from the Internet Archive. Combined, I feel it both explains and makes the case very well for addressing the production gap as a social justice issue.

Filling the Production Gap from Carl Anderson on Vimeo.

View this clip on Blip.tv
View the abridged version on YouTube


While school filtration policies play an important role in sustaining the production gap because they limit our ability to engage students in tools and with information as content producers they are not the only issue. What is more important are practices of pedagogy and I think the video makes this clear. So, how do we fill the production gap? Here are four simple prescriptive steps:

1. Open access to read/write web resources (stop blocking blogs, wikis, podcasts, social networking, and vodcasting sites like YouTube)
2. Create a learner-centered learning environment (tailor learning experiences to individual student interests, needs, and abilities)
3. Engage all students as content producers.
4. Provide all students with a thorough and honest digital literacy education so they understand the levity of what they post online and are able to manipulate the web to meet their academic and entrepreneurial needs.

What are your thoughts? Is the problem laid out here valid? What are the consequences of not addressing the production gap, especially for economically disadvantaged students? Would you change or add any steps to this list? Let me know.

Highlights and reflections from FRONTLINE's Digital Nation

This is by far my favorite clip from PBS's FRONTLINE Digital Nation:



I completely agree with Henry Jenkins on this point. The best way to deal with the "dangers" of the internet is by talking with students honestly, not by putting computers in classrooms, wiring them, then disabling their use.

________________________________________________

This clip makes me respect our Secretary of Education a little bit more:



It is refreshing to hear this message come from the top.

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Of all the clips in this program, this one probably bothers me the most.



I wonder if assistant principal Dan Ackerman realizes how creepy he looks spying on kids through their laptop webcams or how their acceptable use policy still reinforces the production gap in their school even though they have made tremendous gains using technology to help students learn.

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Another great clip by Arne Duncan:



He says opportunity gap, I say production gap. Either way, I agree, "Schools need to be places of opportunity."

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Regarless of how I feel about Prensky's notion of Digital Native/Immigrant I really like what he says about the type of learning activities students want and need to be engage in in this clip:



The second half of this clip where he says, "Schools are no longer the centers of education," is especially of interest and worthy of global conversation.

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This teacher describes a fantastic application of social networking in the classroom:

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In this clip James Paul Gee delivers what is probably the best explanation of school internet filtration policies and the fears people have that drive them that I have ever heard:

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Finally, Henry Jenkins on learning strategies needed in the age of information overload: