"This article is getting some traction, but it would have been nice had the author taken the time to comprehend the theory he is criticizing."

"As for the Internet and our newfound ability to tap into the masses, a more subtle form of havoc arises. Simply put, when you make it easy for everyone to put in his two cents, with little filtering or accountability, the scum tends to rise to the top...For all the excitement generated by social networking sites like Facebook, how many people are actually making valuable contacts on these sites, compared with the amount of time wasted browsing through the sea of goofy material out there?"

"No walls."

Today is the kickoff of the Flat Classroom Project

Synopsis of Project:

Flat Classroom Project Information

Caveats to this project

How your classroom can contribute

So.. a the HTML of a tag to go to the group 1 page would look like this:

href="http://technorati.com/tag/flatclassroomproject06-01" rel="tag">flatclassroomproject06-01

You'll have to type it manually for it to turn out correctly, but I'll include the tags at the bottom of this post and you may copy and paste those.

They may do more than one! All of them should also tag their posts flatclassroomproject06. (You should too if you blog about it!)

4) After writing a blog post, tagging it, and publishing it, they need to "ping" technorati.
Note: The blog must be publicly available for this to work!

a) You can do this manually by copying the URL of their blog posting (On PC, copy the URL in the address box, right click and copy)

b) Then, go to http://www.technorati.com/ping

c) Right click in the box that says "Ping technorati" - and click Paste.

d) Press the button to Ping.

5) Our students are going to add an RSS feed from Technorati for the posts tagged with their specific tags to their individual project pages.

Your students will be able to go back to the wiki and within about an hour see their posts appear on the page. If your students wish to shoot any video or podcasts, they may link to them within their blog posts. Remember to specify the creative commons license holder so that we may cite you as a source in the final product if your interview or opinion is included. Please make them short -- less than 1 minute of video or audio if you wish to "weigh in" on either the educational or industry impact of any of the topics. Please also state your location - city and country. Remember, if you have questions, you may contact me.

Well, hello Mr. Friedman!

In fact, this is how Thomas Friedman must have found Julie's post today about the roll-out of our project. This was the e-mail that she received:

Dear Julie,

I read your blog about the flat world classroom. I was delighted to see it! Tell me how it goes. Yes, this is really Tom Friedman. Allbest, Tom

So, after we scraped ourselves off of our collective blog-ceilings, we went back to work. This is a great project. It is the right thing to do.

Embarking on a journey to the unknown

It has been tough. We've had to invent things from the ground up. This is uncharted territory. Many would not embark out of fear. What will the students do? They age in range from 15-18 year olds. Are we crazy?

Actually, Julie and I have a lot in common, I believe. We both believe the best in our students. And when they fall short, we encourage them to rise to be their best. This is an ambitious project but I believe the first of many for us. (And Julie is just as "sharp as a tack" as we say down here in South Georgia, she makes me look good!)

But perhaps the most exciting thing about this project is that it was initiated by teachers. Two teachers who made a connection via their blogs, found common curricular objectives, created a framework, proposed the methodologies to administrators, and then after visionary administrative approval, move ahead with a project.

This is an upside down topsy-turvy way of doing things that will send shivers down the spine of many an administrator. However, notice that Julie and I both had to secure administrative and curricular approval. We are under our authority and are not renegades. What we are is connectors.

I heard Will Richardson two weeks a go at a conference say something like this:

"Teachers are no longer just content deliverers but are connectors."

The birth of the teacherpreneur

"It depends on whether you are pouring or drinking."

a simulpost with the TechLearning blog.
Note: I don't usually post the same thing in both places, however, I've spent three days on this post and want my readers to have a copy! This is my Thanksgiving Present to You!

As I sit with my morning coffee stuffed bigger than yesterday's unfortunate aviary creature, I have been spending a day being thankful. Today, that mood carries forward as I am thankful for my "birth" into this new blogosphere and thing we call "Web 2.0." I think it is important that I share with you the websites that I am the most thankful for. I've also asked some of my friends on the blogosphere about their favorite websites as well.

(If you'd like to take a "virtual" tour, I've made a trackstar page with annotations so you can click and read. Trackstar is a great tool from 4teachers.)

• He has a blogging experience set up with schools in Japan.
• To set up his projects, he works with other schools and finds them directly. (Flat classroom! Yet another reason principals should blog -- opportunity for students!)
• They use carts of computers and has more demand than resources.
• He discusses the amazing impact on learning. He sees a lot of pride now.
• He says that the research is showing that the difference between "stand and deliver" teaching and project based learning is that students remember the information for a much longer period of time.
• They have an Oscars program.
  
• He has a one day training for parents, students, and teachers. Didn't just train teachers because when students are trained too, teachers can focus on content "not just what button to push" the kids know that!sh
• (They are kicking off this year's project in two weeks -- if you're in Atlanta, you should contact him to see if you could go!)
  

"This is the first and only Level 6 Technology Implementation I've seen in the country. This is the highest level of educational technology integration in the nation."

--Dr. Moersch, principal investigator and creator of the internationally-recognized LoTi (Level of Technology Implementation) Project, and Director and Co-Founder of the National Business Education Alliance

---

"A national treasure"

--Leslie Connery, Deputy CEO and Conference Chair for ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education)

---

"This is as good as anything I've ever seen."

--Patrice Weaver, Operations Manager for GPB (Georgia Public Broadcasting)

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"The Pied Piper of Educational Technology"

--Kathy Ishizuka, The School Library Journal

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Schools of Distinction Award for Technology Innovation

Scholastic and Intel Corporation

Mabryonline.org & itunes – Over 1.5 million files served up a month

He has had contacts from New Delhi, Tasmania, Beijing, Perth, Hong Kong, Republic of Georgia, Canada – They have seen his kids work on the Internet and come to see what they are doing!

The concept of childhood is rather new. We underestimate our children because of childhood.

What is on their minds?
He asked "What do you want to say on the Internet?
They did a movie on human embryonic stem cell research – 7th graders. They landed an interview with Dr. Chatea – two hours in the lab. She presented to them the presentations that she does internationally. They produced an amazing video! (Videos located at http://mabryonline.org/archives/2006/04/2006_film_festi.html)

They shot hours of footage and have to cut down to 2 minutes long. They have to come down and the process to do that was amazing. It required an incredible amount of synthesizing and critical thinking.

It is hard to make it only 2 minutes long. Another team wanted to make a movie on the commercialization of pure drinking water – 12 year olds.

Child slave labor on the ivory coast of Africa that supports the chocolate industry. Child slave labor. They cut great videos. Judges – program director for Georgia Public Broadcasting. AS good as anything she had ever put on the air.

Caring for mentally handicapped. Every time he shows people cry.
Other topics: – child abuse – captivity of elephants. Inspiring people to achieve against all odds.

Some ideas come from their movies. You can go online and watch the movies. The topics are amazing and the quality is amazing.

It is not about technology and connectivity but the subject matter.

Viewed stem cell video.

They decided not to take sides. They split the screen one side and then the other side – they split the screen. Amazing.

6th grade movie on chocolate
The Dark Side of Chocolate. – 6th graders – Amazing – WOW!
Look for Free Trade Chocolate. WOW!
Eleven year olds.

They love doing this b/c it gave them to have the opportunity in their brain that no one could see to share with others around the world.

It is not about technology but connectivity.

Children crave project driven learning experiences to correlate what they learn in school and what they live in their day-to-day lives.

Kids see their future and what school is doing as divergent. Kids want to connect to what they believe is meaningful to their futures.

History of their world – things that didn’t exist.

He said educators need to jump on RSS.

Meaningfulness is the product of connectedness, of sharing, of contribution.

Believes that we best prepare students for their futures by empowering them to make meaningful an dsignifcant contributions to their present.

Not when you graduate you will thank me for this -- you will thank me for this NOW!

Every teacher has a blog and is required to have a blog. The teachers love their blogs. It invites parents to participate in the classroom.

People want to go to their school!

We heard from Stuart Bennett - Chief Deputy Superintendent of Schools, Georgia Department of Education

"Technology will become the backbone of Georgia performance standards. Supt. Cox plans to get behind technology in a big way.

Strong budget support and personal technology learning support. We can expect that."

Funny Take Away Quotes from Wavelength

I have learned from 7 years of teaching that I can sleep anywhere.

I want eLearning - I want to teach from hom in my pajamas.

If we want to be treated like professionals we should act like professionals. Hands business cards. (Now it seems I was just missing a card.)

Some of us are way beyond the basics here [on technology]-- "Yeah, we've almost caught up with the kids."

Everybody tells us how to do their job, but do they want to do it? No.

Education through the ages

"Everyone is concerned about the recent violence in Sparta. All slingshots should be checked at the porticos and all off duty gladiators should go through the hallways during off duty hours. The deities belong at home."

Music before the age of 10 opens childrens minds to more logical, critical, or creative thinking.

An abacus in every classroom. Advocate an abacus for every student. Who can we appoint - whose not here? Meticulous and Ridiculous are not here -- they are on the committee.

Leave no plebian behind. Must do well on the Athenean tests. All students learn differently. We cannot spend all of time taking tests. Do we want to create test takers or lifetime learners?

Her daughter fallopia was harrassed on the bocce court by his son testosterone. NGA - National Gladiators Association.

Uniform togas, two students per pedagog? LSL - Latin as a Second Language - Should we be bending over backwards to cater to these Greek kids?

If I only had 6 months to live - I'd spend it all with my fifth period -- that rowdy class? Yes, then, it would seem like the longest 6 years of my life.

Dr. Phil imitation talking about Nclb

New legislation has politicians and educators driven more crazy than gnats in a yo yo.

Succinct government -- oxymoron.

You went from zero to psycho in 3.2 seconds!

Personal, Social, Vocational, Academic - NCLB only focuses on academic (our education system was founded on all four.)

A tested person is not necessarily an educated person. Take everything out because it is not on the test.

Pour yourself a big cup of calm down! Did you just full out of the dumb tree and hit every branch on the way down?

Don't be so technologically focused that you lose connection with kids.

Zena Warrior Princess Skit

Kicking the horsehockey of a math teacher who thinks he's being effective using math handouts and dry boring lectures.

The three tenures sang-- we'll always have jobs we can't be fired.

Remember why you got into teaching so you are capable of handling yourself well in battle!

Jessie Jackson imitation

A law to improve education may help politicians save face but a mandate without funding is a national disgrace.

It is the DOE not the DOA.

We should not let it become the tech have and tech nots. We must not have cyber segregation or we'll go back on the progress we've made.

You've got to teach a brand new way!

Find the great teachers

Why Should Teachers Blog

"This year there are ten categories:

• Best audio and/or visual blog

• Best group blog

• Best individual blog

• Most influential post, resource or presentation

• Best library/librarian blog

• Best newcomer

• Best research paper on social software within learning and teaching

• Best teacher blog

• Best undergraduate blog

• Best wiki use

Nominations:

Again, nominations are made confidentially. Please email in your nominations to the awards address: 2006awards@googlemail.com

Only current edubloggers are invited to nominate contenders. If you post publicly, and produce some content related to education, you are recognized as an edublogger for the purposes of this competition and are eligible to nominate. Please include your blog url with your nominations.

Each participant is able to make a maximum of two nominations per category. Self-nomination is perfectly acceptable, but you are encouraged to nominate the blogs, projects and papers that you genuinely believe to be outstanding examples of practice. Please list your nominations in order of preference. You may enter the same person or site for more than one award."

• If you want students to treat teachers with respect, treat teachers with respect.
  
  
• If you want students to treat teachers as the authority, give them some authority.
  
  
• If you want teachers to act professional, treat them like professionals.
  
  
• If you want to hold others accountable, accept accountability for your part of the equation.
  
  
• If you want your teachers to be innovators, allow them to be connected to hotbeds of innovation. (Excited teachers are better teachers than bored ones.)
  
  
• Don't judge teachers by their age, some of the most innovative teachers I know have been teaching for 30 years.
  
  
• The morale of your classrooms is related directly to the morale of your teachers.
  
  
• Don't change your mind to agree with the last person who was in your office. At some point you have to make a decision.
  
  
• Understand that testing takes a lot of energy and you have to give children energy to recuperate -- one wouldn't draw blood once a week to make sure a person was healthy, the process of over testing can be harmful to their health.
  
  
• Good learning is fun and exciting! It is OK to laugh and learn!
  
  
• Administrators who go on "witch hunts" end up on trial eventually. Great managers motivate and turn around the employees they have and hire the best as opportunity arises.
  
  
• Teachers always talk. They will not keep your confidence. Do not say anything to one teacher that you don't want repeated to everyone else. (If you speak well of teachers in private, this spreads and is a great way to build trust.)
  
  
• Don't advocate character education if you're not willing to act with character yourself. Be trustworthy, care, remember teachers are human, and do your best.
  
  
• People aren't disposable.
  
  
• You can employ a person, but only they employ their own soul. A teacher with their soul in their work is a better teacher than one going through the motions.
  
  
• Good administrators are like good coaches - they give their teachers a vision and a person that they can believe in and trust.
  
  
• Sometimes HOW you say something is more important than WHAT you say.
  
  
• Sometimes HOW you do something is more important than WHAT you do.
  
  
• There is no limit to what you can do if you're willing to give others credit.
  
  
• Hire good teachers and let them teach.
  
  
• Sometimes it is more important to do the right thing than to be right. (Good captains change course when they see they are heading into a deadly storm.)
  
  
• Be in the now. Look at people when they talk to you. Your job is people. You can take papers at home with you at night. (When you talk to someone, you should be reading their body language. People think you don't care when you don't look at them.)
  
  
• Spend your time removing roadblocks, not being one.

The scientist who created the World Wide Web said Thursday that if trends continue, the Internet could become an "undemocratic" virtual space riddled with "misinformation" and "untruths".

In an interview with the BBC, Tim Berners-Lee, who founded the Internet in the early 1990s, said blogs are particularly to blame in the propagating of false or misguided information on the web.

"The blogging world works by people reading blogs and linking to them. You're taking suggestions of what you should read from people you trust."

And, fortunately, we have blogs. We can publish what we actually think, even when misreported.

"underlined a need for bloggers to more consistently establish original sources."

Creative commons licensing has certainly thrown many citation purists for a loop. I find people all of the time who cite from my blog without linking to my blog. There is a real need for educators to wrestle with this and to propose some standards of ethical blogging behavior. There is not a lot of information in this area and the rubrics I've developed are my own.

Several of my rules concerning this are that:

A) If you cite it, link to it.
B) If you quote it, cite it.

I believe we will need a blog version of turnitin.com that could scan student blogs for plagiarism. With information becoming the primary product of America and other leading societies, information integrity and ethics are vital to our future! Educators must wake up to this very important fact.

#2 We must cooperate to engineer the future of the Internet

The professor also sees a need to bring together scientists from a variety of disciplines into a kind of think tank dedicated to analyzing the web and its future.

"People with all kinds of skills and knowledge are going to need to work together in order to understand the web and in order to build a web which is going to be even better," he said.

It's not just scientists any more

I agree and disagree with this statement. First of all, the Internet has moved far past the initial scientific realm. Pure scientists (those involved in basic research) tend to have an idealism and natural proclivity for perfection that doesn't stick in our "quick and dirty world."

It is about planning the future of the Internet

Yes, I agree that people with all kids of skills and knowledge need to work together to improve it and make it better, but just as the Internet is a mosaic of a diverse group of people, so should its future be molded.

So, if I had my wish list about the future of the Internet, here is what I'd wish for:

• Automatic spell checkers in every text box -- it would automatically highlight incorrectly spelled words. Blogging posts and comment boxes are rife with typos -- not because we don't care but because we are humans.
  
  
• Automatic citation builders -- When I highlight and put a hyperlink in a post, I'd like my blog (and wiki) to put the full citation at the end. If we had a standard for saving citation information on a web page, this would be a cinch on the programming side of things.
  
  
• Automatic citation builders - part 2 - When I copy and paste more than a certain portion of text from another source, I'd like my blog (and wiki) to build the citation for me as well. This should be an automatic for school-based applications.
  
  
• MLA Standards for the Internet - I have been so disappointed at the perceived weak response of the Modern Language Association to the need for meaningful Internet citations. I know some educators who have switched to APA for this reason. (I'd love to hear from someone who is more "in the know" on this topic.)
  
  
• Plagiarism Checkers for Student Blogs - We have turnitin.com for papers, we need the same for blogs and wikis. (We will need the same for audio in podcasts and video as well. If you can cite it, we need it.)
  
  
• Privacy Protection Measures for Children under a certain age - Parents need easy ways to monitor their children. They also need guidance as to when privacy issues occur with their children's accounts. There is need for discussion to occur in this area.
  
  Additionally, children doing mandatory assignments should not be allowed to publish under their real names. How many of you want your opinion as a 16 year old to haunt you for the rest of your life? We are allowing students to create virtual tattoos that no amount of electronic skin removal will take off. We should protect and teach those who are most vulnerable -- our children.
  
  
• Standards for Educational material - The move towards tagging is great, however the non-standardization of tagging is beyond frustrating. I was particularly pleased with the proposal that came from our Tagging To Help Teachers group on the K12wiki project.
  
  This presentation included an amazingly insightful proposal for tag standards. It is a good starting point. I keep wondering, why are national associations who are so big on standardization not creating easy ways to standardize tagging? It is vital to the finding of meaningful information on the Internet for educators. Here is what they proposed:
  
  

  PROPOSAL FOR STANDARDS:

  ---

  There should be at least 3 tags used for tagging bookmarks, photos, websites, and blog entries.
  
  One tag must have the grade level. Tags should be either Kindergarten, 1stGrade, 2ndGrade, 3rdGrade, 4thGrade......12thGrade. If it is all grades, use k12.
  
  Another tag must contain the subject, but make it broad. Examples include Math, English, Science, SocialStudies, Technology, PhysicalEd, and Music.
  High School teachers who are teaching Math, Science, Social Studies, or another specific class must add another tag. Examples include Algebra, Geometry, Chemistry, Biology, WorldHistory, USHistory, and Geography.
  
  Then you need to add at least one tag that is specific. For example, you are tagging a website about adding fractions. You can either tag it as Addition and/or Fractions.
  
  Here is an example of this tagging standard: 11thGrade Math Algebra Addition Fractions
  Note that this has 5 different tags.
  
  To find resources that are tagged with all 5 tags you would use
  11thGrade+Math+Algebra+Addition+Fractions
  
  Regardless of what is established, technology leaders should be setting the path for the future with tagging. If we can set some standards, then the tags created later can be understood by all.

  
  

A note on K12 wiki projects
I must express here my pleasure in many of the k12wiki projects. I will be blogging and highlighting more about these in the future (and am sorry I haven't done it yet, I think I have k12onlineconference-itis and am having trouble getting finished with my skypecast editing.)

Standards Discussions

Educators, it is time to have our part in this discussion. We have allowed the walled gardens created for student use wall us off from each other!

I get emails daily from teachers who complain that they have to go home to read my blog! Many cannot view and see our amazing math wiki project that took NCTM math strands and categorized an amazing group of videos for use in the math classroom. (I used the Exponent review for my SAT review last week -- it is a great video.)

Where should the Internet go from here? It is time to engage in meaningful discussion about where this is going.

Pew Studies Web 2.0 - Released today

Today a new Pew memorandum was released about Web 2.0. They have studied the phrase and analyzed the facts to see what they bear out.

Interestingly, 34% have used the Internet for photo retrieval or sharing while only around 8% for personal blogging and 13% for professional or group blogs. Also interesting, social networking accounts for 11% of people surveyed.

Interestingly, they have a chart comparing Wikipedia and Encarta aptly subtitled "Wikipedia Soars as Encarta Dwindles." Twenty four (24%) per cent of users on Wikipedia in the sample week were younger than eighteen. Compare that to the other chart entitled "Myspace dominates as Geocities crumble." (Subtitle: Social 2.0)

Despite all the hype, the analysis reminds us that asynchronous e-mail is still the predominant use of the Internet. (Reminding educators to not forget Internet etiquette and e-mail use as of top importance.)

Their conclusion is hauntingly prophetic:

The Geocities vs. MySpace comparison not only demonstrates the commonalities between the Internet of 1996 and 2006, but it also provides a point of departure for understanding concepts of on line presence in the Web 2.0 era. While the Geocities model relied on the metaphors of a place (cities, neighborhoods, homepages), MySpace anchors presence through metaphors of a person (profiles, blogs, links to videos, etc.). Geocities encouraged us to create our own cities and neighborhoods as points of entry to our personal worlds; MySpace cuts to the chase and enables direct access to the person, as well as access to his or her social world. And whether we call the current world 2.0 or 10.0, there’s no question that the Internet of today will look positively beta to future generations.

To ignore Web 2.0 is to miss the opportunity to introduce children of today to the technological infant that will become the giant of their future. Additionally, we have an increased opportunity to connect to students on a personal level.

What do you think?

What should the "future Internet" look like and how should educators be involved?

Tags: Web 2.0, Tim Berners-Lee, PEW, education, teaching, tagging, k12onlineconference, k12online06, creative commons, plagiarism, education 2.0, standards, coolcatteacher, Vicki A Davis, Vicki Davis

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Blogging is like football

1 - One play at a time

2 - Sometimes plays go right, sometimes they go wrong

"The best kickers will miss one in every five kicks."

3 - Keep your head in the game (and not on the rankings)

4- Character flaws off the field can affect your game.

5 - Performance on the field can affect your life off the field.

"They train paramedics not to run. When they run, their adrenaline gets going and they get emotional and they make bad judgment calls with someone's life. They are trained to stay focused and keep from getting overly emotional."

6 - Don't let "Monday Morning Quarterbacks" ruin your day, but respect the opinion of seasoned coaches

7- Don't use the fact that you are human as an excuse to not push towards perfection.

"You're never going to make it, you're just a small town hick." "You're just here to get an MRS degree." (Find someone to marry.) "Your school was too small and not good enough, you can't keep up with us highly educated big city folks who've all had at least 4 AP classes apiece."

"Blogging is stupid." "Who cares about blogging?" "Who are you anyway?" "You can't make a difference." And on and on.

8 - Perfection is an illusion.

9 - Scrimmage Games are not a lot of fun to watch

10 - Fans make a big difference

Enjoy the game!

"What's the use of a baby?"

So, what do you think? How do you think blogging is (or isn't) like football (or your favorite sport.)

Tags: football, blogging, education, teaching, teacher blog, Cool Cat Teacher, Vicki A Davis, Vicki Davis, Georgia Tech, Morten Anderson, Dale Carnegie, blogging, blogosphere, Adam Sandler, Cindy Crawford

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