tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26849674881143382382024-03-21T00:27:05.028-07:00The Next StepA place for an average student centered, online ed, social studies, technology focused, reform minded, charter school based teacher to talk about education.Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.comBlogger36125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-23999907458616333752008-04-17T10:52:00.000-07:002008-04-17T11:02:24.464-07:00The Next Step has MovedI moved my blog over to Edublogs.<br /><br /><a href="http://thenextstep.edublogs.org/">Click here</a> to come hang out.Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com68tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-67985788856745180952008-03-29T17:55:00.000-07:002008-03-29T18:24:20.084-07:00Chiming in on DiigoMuch like I feel in love with Obama after seeing <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dyjXt1zSXHU">this video</a>, I got hooked on Diigo after <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RvAkTuL02A">a similarly stimulating four minutes.</a> :) Well, maybe I'm exaggerating a little....<br /><br />A friend tweeted out the above noted video for the Diigo Beta V3 this week and it kicked off a firestorm. I've been playing with Diigo all week, just like the rest of the <a href="http://groups.diigo.com/groups/twitter-freaks">Twitter Freaks</a>, and am really intrigued. While most of my friends in the network are excited at how Diigo combines the tools from Delicious, Facebook, and Zotero, I'm just ecstatic about annotated url's. Sounds a little strange to say outloud but let me explain.<br /><br />I hate textbooks. I don't use them, and so far have been lucky enough to avoid them in my four years of teaching. I've always known there was a reason I didn't like them. Used to think it was because they only promoted rich white men, and were super boring, but besides that couldn't put my finger on why they made me so uncomfortable. Then I read James Loewen's book called <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=ba1gAAAACAAJ&dq=James+W+Loewen&hl=en&prev=http://www.google.com/search?q=James+loewen&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS262US262&sa=X&oi=print&ct=result&cd=2&cad=author-navigational"><span style="font-style: italic;">Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong</span></a> and it all made sense. Between him and Howard Zinn, I decided that I would do my best to avoid textbooks during my teaching career.<br /><br />Normally I research sites on the web and then direct kids to those sites when I want them to get a piece of info. Sometimes its complicated because I say things like, "click here, read the 3rd and 7th paragraphs." That's pretty silly but without cutting and pasting to create a new document, that was my only option. Enter Diigo. I can go to a site, highlight the passages I think are the most relevant, comment (sticky note) on those passages and produce an annotated url that I can give to my students. That <a href="http://www.diigo.com/annotated/e00561ad6c26322a75e9888dd76b1ad1">special url</a> comes complete with highlights and comments from me or from everyone who has annotated that page if I wish. <br /><br />I teach online. Only online. So every lesson I create for my students, whether its for the Web 2.0 class I'm developing for next year, or the Travel course I made last year, all my resources come from searching the Internet. Diigo is a one stop solution to including that material in my courses. There are still some pretty gnarly quirks they have to figure out (annotations don't work all the time, 'twitter this' function is spotty, and lots of stalls in application processing) the potential is ridiculous. And thats after only one week of playing, there is still way more to learn.<br /><br />For a comprehensive analysis of the social networking benefits of Diigo, check out <a href="http://khokanson.blogspot.com/2008/03/dig-ging-diigo.html">Kristin Hokanson's blog from earlier this week.</a>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-18427805862256745972008-03-10T19:31:00.000-07:002008-03-10T20:24:34.409-07:00Web 2.0 Spreading Like a Subtle Rash<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipZUPlghL780o6mRMnWzpCbtn1R2i2WznpT_VN1Um-I9TxX01iPpnqyh93qfKihLG086GikK0hUKhEukbh852koJ27oClvY1hqkUXFFwGDnQNE8hdUrrGE4b3EkqMAyeCs75ZA2EMJKCRf/s1600-h/itchy+elephant.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipZUPlghL780o6mRMnWzpCbtn1R2i2WznpT_VN1Um-I9TxX01iPpnqyh93qfKihLG086GikK0hUKhEukbh852koJ27oClvY1hqkUXFFwGDnQNE8hdUrrGE4b3EkqMAyeCs75ZA2EMJKCRf/s200/itchy+elephant.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5176319149322357362" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />So I had a really good technology day at work. A few more teachers at my ONLINE HS are moving towards using Web 2.0, taking active steps to incorporate it in their personal lives and online courses. Yes, those are separate... for some. Geez, I need to get off this computer.<br /><br />It started this morning when our lead Website Designer who is also an education technology assistant at our school asked me about Web 2.o. He said that the <a href="http://www.ncce.org/">NCCE conference</a> last week really got him thinking about the education possibilities for the first time. He came to ask me if I would like to participate in a video he wants to create and put up on Youtube. He was excited about creating media (podcasts, videos) that kids could watch anywhere and use to learn on the run. Then I brought up the idea of the "<a href="http://paradigmwatch.blogspot.com/2008/01/hurtling-toward-smart-new-world.html">democratization of learning</a>" and he about lost his mind. Loved it. Wanted to hear all about how to get kids to create their own learning experience. This is good news. A lot of the teachers ask him for help, if he becomes another voice of progress at our school then the 2.0 Rash might get airborne.<br /><br />A couple hours later a teacher and I were talking about blogs in our courses. I use them, she isn't quite there yet. She teaches in the other hybrid component of our school which is a face-to-face elective course and only recently has begun knocking down those four walls. Our blog conversation led to RSS Feeds and pretty soon I was helping her set up her Google Reader and hooked her up with two must read edublogs: <a href="http://mrmoses.org/">mrmoses.org</a> and <a href="http://davidwarlick.com/2cents/">2 Cents Worth.</a><br /><br />Worlds are a changing, the wind is blowing through our building, I can feel just the slightest barometric shift.<br /><br />Last and most certainly least, I received a new course shell in my ridiculously difficult to use <a href="http://www.ecollege.com/index.learn">CMS</a> today. It was a gift of my admin who approved a slightly innovative elective course I've been mentally developing since a nagging thought kept me awake all night about 2 months ago. Its a Web 2.0 course where I teach students how to use all the main online tools that many of us are using already, however, only a small handful of my school's students are using right now. The kicker is, it's 100% cross-curriculum. I will help the kids learn how to use the project tools, but the content for all of their projects will come from their 5 other online courses. For example, they will create an <a href="http://xtimeline.com/">xtimeline</a> using all of the material from a unit in their U.S. History course. Maybe their core teachers will let them get cross-credit for the project they develop in my course, maybe not. But no matter what they will learn more than they would if they just did it one way. Especially if that one way was a very old fashioned way, and that will spread.....like a rash.Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-68411527378029855262008-03-06T12:21:00.000-08:002008-03-06T19:35:34.500-08:00Over 200 Kids in our Social Experiment<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-ZSzjWpUNbrDt0BjGmIoDZ_PQzyB7teW4BldkBSrrVtukBo9zFoL6qQDh0STXD8ew51FHRjpTloC2-cVBx9uTDtty_bS3a0I_fZzc3NtYpCF-TucMwjoE36dlnUwFdvEI9QO3BY4pfMm8/s1600-h/FireShot+capture+%233+-+%27Odyssey+of+the+Mind%27+-+odysseystudents_ning_com.png"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-ZSzjWpUNbrDt0BjGmIoDZ_PQzyB7teW4BldkBSrrVtukBo9zFoL6qQDh0STXD8ew51FHRjpTloC2-cVBx9uTDtty_bS3a0I_fZzc3NtYpCF-TucMwjoE36dlnUwFdvEI9QO3BY4pfMm8/s320/FireShot+capture+%233+-+%27Odyssey+of+the+Mind%27+-+odysseystudents_ning_com.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5174742720727301378" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Its been several weeks since I posted and undoubtedly the main reason why is because of the social network we are testing out at my online school. Plain and simple, its time consuming.<br /><br />Really time consuming.... but worth it.<br /><br />Last school year I began running groups through Facebook as a way to extend my classroom and get more kids actively engaged. Then I moved to my own Ning network the first semester of this year. It was all volunteer and I was only able to get about 30 of my online kids to sign up. There just wasn't enough energy created with such a small group of kids in the network.<br /><br />In January, I decided that I wanted to expand the network and run a pilot program with several other teachers. We all invited our students, over 500 out of the 725 at our school, and the network began expanding rapidly. With that expansion come quirks and frustrations, but there is something really great going on in our student network. We have 205 students right now and more are joining everyday as the word gets out. Here are some of my initial Pros and Cons after 4 weeks of operation.<br /><br />Pros:<br />1. At an online school there isn't much opportunity for socializing. Our network is really helping to fill that void for some students.<br />2. Students are starting their own groups. There is a writing group, a music group, a teen help group and many more. Really cool stuff happening there.<br />3. Students have an opportunity to help each other with school. Before the network, you basically had to randomly meet someone on campus who just happened to be in your online course, or blindly email them from that course, if you wanted to contact them. Now we have a place where kids can communicate about their classes, teachers and other school related issues.<br />4. While there have been some music uploads and some innapropriate language, for the most part kids are taking ownership of this network and not misusing it.<br /><br />Cons:<br />1. It takes a ton of time. I am logged into the network all day and night until bed. The main issues are moderating comments. We have to be careful students aren't blatantly misusing the network because our parent complaints could cause admin to shut us down at any moment. Its a BIG job monitoring the network with that responsibility.<br />2. We have some quirky computer issues at our school. Since students come once a week for 4 hours, at any given time there is about 80 kids on campus. They are all using thin clients which connect to several main servers. When a student in Classroom A is on Odyssey of the Mind, another student in Classroom C could log into the first persons account. Beyond teaching kids to sign out of webpages when they are finished with them, not sure how this is fixable. Its a hardware issue that I have no control over or suggestions of how to work around. yuck!<br /><br />I can only think of two cons, thats pretty good :)<br /><br />Right now the teachers involved in OOTM are letting the kids get accustomed to the network and socialize. This is a very good thing and helps lay the foundation for what we can do with them once they have bought into the value of this network. However, pretty soon I would like to get kids more actively involved in their course work. <a href="http://mrmoses.org/?p=260">Our assistant principal is doing a fantastic job of this with his Government class</a> and has set a good example of what we can do in the near future.<br /><br />I'm not sure its enough that we have the network just to allow kids to feel more connected to our school. I'm not sure the network is doing everything it can if we only create community. Those are big, but not quite enough. We have to use the network to really get our kids learning on a collaborative level.Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-6134595792502582042008-02-11T19:15:00.000-08:002008-02-11T19:45:48.683-08:00Student Voice + Google 20%<a href="http://www.teachandlearn.ca/blog/static-page-1/">Konrad Glogowski </a>presented at EduCon2.0 about using blogs with students. At the beginning of his presentation I was thinking, "well, I already use blogs with my students so not sure if this is going to be useful." I kept my ears open and pretty soon heard something that I've thought about everyday since. One of his main themes was losing your teacher voice and giving the students one. He described how important it was to let students establish the confidence to write online knowing that it could be read by other students. The way he made this happen was by allowing students to write about nonacademic topics for a little while. He would then have a conversation with them through comments. He threw away that teacher tone for the rest of the year. No more looking at writing through the eyes of someone grading it on grammar and punctuation. Talk to your kids about what they are writing, listen to their voice.<br /><br />Google allows its employees to spend <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/05/googles-20-percent-time-in-action.html">20% of their time</a> (one day/wk) working on a project outside their job requirements. I've thought a lot about how to apply this to my courses and it wasn't until this week that a light bulb went on and I settled on something. Why not combine Konrad's idea of student voice with Google 20%? Here is what I came up with.<br /><br />I will encourage students to earn 20% of their points for the week just writing in their blog. For example (a rough estimate), if they have a 100 point project due that week, 20 points will come from their blog and can be applied as extra credit or as a substitute for some of the project requirements. (logistics will fall into place a little later). There will have to be a couple caveats though:<br />1. Early on in the process they can write about anything on their mind.<span style="font-style: italic;"> </span><br />2. The students must only write things they are willing to share with other students.<br />3. As the semester progresses, the blogs will start to incorporate more and more ideas from our content.<br /><br />Any suggestions? Arguments?<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKySxnhblKn7MOKeb-GORll5Z7E5gHHIePqBTZOfIw6unu7KDFM0CCaZ2-c-ZyxqxkF-P0mnxrgMYAUAturj7djzZxN55WUEdMTUVZJs8VX7F7qpOFiafN5gTyyv0ODWgtU0gez5JxXgEu/s1600-h/mouth+open-student+voice.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKySxnhblKn7MOKeb-GORll5Z7E5gHHIePqBTZOfIw6unu7KDFM0CCaZ2-c-ZyxqxkF-P0mnxrgMYAUAturj7djzZxN55WUEdMTUVZJs8VX7F7qpOFiafN5gTyyv0ODWgtU0gez5JxXgEu/s200/mouth+open-student+voice.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5165934722242236274" border="0" /></a>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-78355683308311727382008-02-10T21:04:00.000-08:002008-02-10T21:26:29.355-08:00Getting My School Network Off the GroundOn Friday I organized a meeting with about 6 teachers and my assistant principal and discussed the possibility of running an online social network at our virtual school. All the teachers and admin at the meeting liked the idea and have volunteered to be network administrators to help me monitor the content. The pilot program will include the small group of teachers and however many students volunteer out of the 400-500 that I am inviting. When Ive done this in the past with just my online students, I usually get a 25% sign up rate. So there is a good possible we might get over 100 additional students in the network. I've sent out 375 invites this weekend and in the last 24 hours, 15 students have signed up. <span style="font-style: italic;">These are students who are reading their emails on the weekends</span> so its off to a good start.<br /><br />The main reason for trying to expand this from my 4 online courses to over 10 classes is too try and create a community at my school. Students are not connected at our charter school. They come in once a week and sit on computers (for the most part) and rarely talk with other students. They almost NEVER talk with other students about school related issues. It would be great if kids joined <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/10380973@N02/2257279794/sizes/o/">Odyssey of the Mind (pic)</a>, made some friends, and eventually began collaborating. It should be fairly easy to get kids working on projects together if they knew each other. To take it a little further, with 7 teachers and a hundred kids, there is no reason that we can't begin doing cross curriculum projects.<br /><br />There are so many possibilities for our kids if this works. Engage, collaborate, befriend, help, share, expand.......<br /><br />If anyone has any suggestions or ideas about making this work, you know what to do....<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0P_tx9U1eFkuD-bte6M_5cAIEuGWgFE3ct-3HoUZs1ytva7EdBQJCd2VanmoWDv_Le6hQtJDd1uEOYJzE2IV9KeNWJhzr9vWsVAnAJcZlugOURKe1Oj2iOihdQXDE_7IQ5WJpRdF7IjKX/s1600-h/engaged.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0P_tx9U1eFkuD-bte6M_5cAIEuGWgFE3ct-3HoUZs1ytva7EdBQJCd2VanmoWDv_Le6hQtJDd1uEOYJzE2IV9KeNWJhzr9vWsVAnAJcZlugOURKe1Oj2iOihdQXDE_7IQ5WJpRdF7IjKX/s200/engaged.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5165589157763534690" border="0" /></a>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-65798582063068937472008-02-07T11:52:00.000-08:002008-02-07T14:53:52.512-08:00Nominate an Educator Using Technology CreativelyIn a session at Educon2.0 we came up with an action plan centered on getting the word out about what we were all doing in our schools/districts/states to bring technology and learning to the 21st Century Student. This just landed in my lap and thought it would be a great way to promote the people out here doing some fantastic things with kids:<br /><br /><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="font-size:100%;">Hello, I am a graduate research assistant from Northern Arizona<br />University currently working with Dr. Jess House on research for an<br />upcoming book </span><b>Creative Classrooms: Technology in America's Schools.</b><br /><span style="font-size:100%;">This book will feature exemplary uses of educational technology in the<br />21st century. It will illustrate how classroom teachers, technology<br />specialists, and administrators are creatively integrating technology<br />into the curriculum and using it to increase student achievement.<br />Currently, we are seeking nominations for recent programs or projects<br />from your region that demonstrate unique and creative approaches to<br />using technology in the K-12 classroom setting. We are especially<br />interested in projects that are occurring at the classroom level (e.g.<br />teacher created projects that integrate technology into a specific<br />curriculum area). We would like to represent fine models from each<br />state and hope that you can assist us in nominating exceptional projects<br />from your area.<br />If you are interested in nominating any notable programs or teachers<br />for this book, please send nominations to: </span><a href="https://mail.google.com/mail?view=cm&tf=0&to=merri.nau@gmail.com" target="_blank">merri.nau@gmail.com</a><span style="font-size:100%;"> by Friday<br />February 15, 2008.<br /><br />In the nomination please include:<br />• Location<br />• Contact information for the teacher or educational professional<br />• Brief description of the program (technology and resources used,<br />subject matter, grade level, unique qualities)<br /><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="font-size:100%;">Thank you for your time and efforts.<br />Sincerely,<br />Merri Bath<br />Northern Arizona University<br /></span></span><span style=";font-family:";font-size:12;" ><st1:place st="on"><st1:placetype st="on"></st1:placetype></st1:place></span>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-52559134898901916432008-02-07T10:39:00.000-08:002008-02-07T10:57:58.413-08:00Simple, but Cool Afternoon with Kids<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm6tqEdiUjtnIc1LYzT9fp_hd64vTkhZtYjFt6Uhyphenhyphenpyh6IV7YpUDwaKfe6a_nTvEUgfnMXp6ZlVMtwJX-mcHfb-OUHrIfuuaR0Kb6Ar95LTNUbte0zzsI1fA9n4eZVsORQUJuSTCk2t1bF/s1600-h/happy+cue+balls.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgm6tqEdiUjtnIc1LYzT9fp_hd64vTkhZtYjFt6Uhyphenhyphenpyh6IV7YpUDwaKfe6a_nTvEUgfnMXp6ZlVMtwJX-mcHfb-OUHrIfuuaR0Kb6Ar95LTNUbte0zzsI1fA9n4eZVsORQUJuSTCk2t1bF/s200/happy+cue+balls.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5164313560229616338" border="0" /></a><br />A little background. Our school is an online high school with a single day face-to-face component. Our interaction with these kids is limited for a number of reasons. They only come on campus once a week and its usually not to see their online teachers (me). Many of the phone numbers they provide us are disconnected and/or they just don't answer. The main form of communication is email, and whenever I send out an email asking for all students to reply back (usually at beginning of semester to set up my Outlook) I get only about a 20% response. The kids at our school aren't the tech savvy teenagers that are rumored to be about and email is often ignored even though that is how we "talk" with kids. On top of all those factors, I'm working from home and taking care of my son right now so even more limited on communication. That's what made the other day so cool.<br /><br />I received a new student at the 2nd semester and she was turning in her first short essay paper too me. She uploaded a .wps file which our computers won't open so we ask all docs be converted to .rtf. I have a form email that I send out for this very occasion. A day later I received a frantic email from her saying that she tried and tried to convert the document but just didn't understand what my email was saying. I asked her for her phone number so we could walk through it. A few hours later, I was using Skypeout and showing her this process. While we are on the topic I taught her how to make folders for each of her online courses so she could organize her work. Then the little light bulb that is Google Docs went off and made a deal with her to get her Google Doc account up and running (I couldn't do it at that moment because we were 20 minutes into the call and baby was screaming).<br /><br />A few minutes after I got off the phone with her and the baby had calmed down, I received an instant message from another student. She needed some assistance with a class assignment so we walked through that via chat. An hour later I received another message from my Facebook account that a former student wanted some tutoring for her high school writing exit exam. We made temporary plans to set that up soon. While I was on Facebook another student chimed in with some concerns about a grade he had received at the semester, it wasn't in my class, but as his mentor teacher I promised to talk with his English teacher on his behalf.<br /><br />Could all of this have happened at a traditional school in such a short period of time? Of course. Could all of this have happened at my virtual school a year ago, no way. The use of these social tools has changed the way I collaborate and interact with my kids. Now just hoping others at the school will see the benefit.Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-22064659982324701282008-02-05T15:17:00.000-08:002008-02-05T16:33:51.569-08:00EduCon Action Plan- Part 1<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEga7gAawDpZnsiaLqBfrGr-grlcEthSlk5PcFD_JVnNOsiOPcAuR6xnCvkoXy8riVndpSdnlVBP5T3ck_JbGOsbKnTjpgubruZfxCkMCCXNirm49VnZt4ETQM1BWfue1-UIoKPfzk_6iw8O/s1600-h/expand.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEga7gAawDpZnsiaLqBfrGr-grlcEthSlk5PcFD_JVnNOsiOPcAuR6xnCvkoXy8riVndpSdnlVBP5T3ck_JbGOsbKnTjpgubruZfxCkMCCXNirm49VnZt4ETQM1BWfue1-UIoKPfzk_6iw8O/s200/expand.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5163658105270573762" border="0" /></a><br />At the final session on the final day of EduCon 2.o a group of us came up with an action plan to get the word out about what we are doing in our schools that is unique and a part of school reform. Before I can get going to far into that plan, which involves media, politicians, school boards and other powers that be, I have a personal plan to put in place. Part 1 starts with my kids.<br /><br />A little background...About 12 months ago I began reaching out of our course management system to try and broaden student collaboration. I wanted to find an engaging way to reach students where they spent their time and get them to talk to other students in my courses about ideas. My first attempt was in Facebook. I created a group for each course I teach, limited the members of the group and the action within the group to our school's students, and operated them on a volunteer basis. I had about 10% of my students join up and from there we spent the 2nd semester last year collaborating on a much deeper level than students replying on our CMS discussion board. The idea was to give students a voice and it worked, a little bit. Since then I've left Facebook for Ning and was happy with the results, but still want more. My courses utilize tons of <a href="http://mrplough07.blogspot.com/">Web 2.0 tools</a> for our projects, but once again they are all optional. I need to find a way to build those into the content, seamlessly.<br /><br />After seeing the amazing community between staff and students at Science Leadership Academy, I knew I had to figure out a way to foster that with even more impetus at my school. Thats where part one of my Educon Personal Action Plan comes into play. We have to foster community at our school in two forms. Since it is a hybrid school and students come once a week on campus, we have to figure out how to make that four hours of time community and relationship based. This will take some serious rehauling (will address in Part 2 of the plan), so will save for a little later. Secondly, I have to get kids more engaged, more driven, and more of a voice instantly. I can't wait any longer. The first step that I put into place was to implement a <a href="http://amfilm.blogspot.com/">blog as a discussion tool</a> for historical assignments in my history through film course. The next step is to enlarge <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/10380973@N02/2244766141/sizes/o/">our student network</a> to include students from a variety of courses at our school. As well as a variety of teachers. Then, get them talking about how we can change our school. The third part is to revamp my courses so that a lot of the project based assignments are completed using read/write/web tools but teach them how to use the tools within the lesson rather than giving students an option with dozens of choices. As someone put it at Educon2, "we need to make the technology invisible." This is a start.<br /><br />I know that technology is only a tool, but at an online school its the best one we have, and I need to make it even better. I'm open for some more suggestions on this topic and will start discussing changing things I can't control in Part 2 of the plan.Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-57585960540249387032008-01-30T22:19:00.000-08:002008-01-30T22:51:19.084-08:00School Reform at Educon 2.0<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH90a6q9APT6hUbsnzYv-BQ1OBI0l8htjEV3e1TVAZBVAUPm6d5UtufI9lZRzqqTFZidF31zpdjlBVXAB_mHoQRXIBBfxqcyRF0NbEk-yXFEXUTxJZiV6gvDXF0ADwQGqf4UFNk7bEJpYH/s1600-h/educon+2.0.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5161529313320245938" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH90a6q9APT6hUbsnzYv-BQ1OBI0l8htjEV3e1TVAZBVAUPm6d5UtufI9lZRzqqTFZidF31zpdjlBVXAB_mHoQRXIBBfxqcyRF0NbEk-yXFEXUTxJZiV6gvDXF0ADwQGqf4UFNk7bEJpYH/s200/educon+2.0.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><div>First off, I know I've been gone a long time. I have been at home with my 6 month old son and completely out of the loop. At least I was, <a href="http://educon20.wikispaces.com/">Educon</a> changed that.</div><br /><div></div><br /><div>Now I know I'm fairly new in the edublogosphere. I also know that I'm fairly new to school reform. My hope is that those 2 things are connected because the only place that I'm really hearing anything about true change, systemic change, is online. That changed when I went to Philly last weekend and spent three days with the students and teachers at the <a href="http://www.scienceleadership.org/">Science Leadership Academy.</a> That school has it figured out and <a href="http://www.blogger.com/www.practicaltheory.org/">Chris Lehman</a> was nice enough to allow us to all come see his inspired creation and then let us hang out for a couple days and argue ways of change.</div><br /><div></div><br /><div>This was the first conference I've ever been to where every session (well, almost every session, not everyone got it) was a discussion about how to really change schools. The discussions ranged from <a href="http://educon20.wikispaces.com/SAT05RM308">how we communicate with kids</a> in class to how we <a href="http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/AQLr77jM9eUYQDnofh2R8JgsRIy5ioRx">interact collaboratively outside the four walls</a> to here is <a href="http://educon20.wikispaces.com/SAT06RM301">our action plan </a>to let the world know great things can be done.</div><br /><div></div><br /><div>4 days later and my mind is still buzzing with what I can do in my online courses while at the same time stewing with how to reform our school. Step one is <a href="http://www.mind42.com/pub/mindmap?mid=687a4327-47e4-4b4b-a797-182129edeacb">to take action using the strategic ideas </a>of Zac Chase and our small discussion group. Anyone doing anything special with your students that is a slap to the face of traditional education, please take some of these baby steps. </div><br /><div></div><br /><div></div>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-69782448400742410262007-11-16T13:02:00.000-08:002007-11-16T14:51:47.612-08:00Failure Rates<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnn7wLrobvugtRb0KLZdk83oH7CZF5hZ9dU9Zhyphenhyphenm58Rdamj-YWxyL9Q4iNXX5NQQSIsfuoaRKWv_HcjfUzG72lvRaBiRgzV6Ri-348yQQFAf1tfVEs0wKS9LJDkRBpoDZA5oRS3W3iWJ68/s1600-h/failure.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5133551792822499682" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" height="143" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnn7wLrobvugtRb0KLZdk83oH7CZF5hZ9dU9Zhyphenhyphenm58Rdamj-YWxyL9Q4iNXX5NQQSIsfuoaRKWv_HcjfUzG72lvRaBiRgzV6Ri-348yQQFAf1tfVEs0wKS9LJDkRBpoDZA5oRS3W3iWJ68/s320/failure.jpg" width="259" border="0" /></a><br /><div>I just received an email from our outstanding office manager with a list of students who had been withdrawn from school for truancy (etc.) There was a list of about 20 kids which is only a small fraction of the 650 or so left here. Each of the kids were listed with a withdrawal code next to their names. This comment was at the top of the email:</div><br /><div></div><br /><div><em>"I'm sending a list of students that have been W/D this past month. Please look over the list to see if any of them are on your class list..... <strong>It should be good news for your failure rate</strong>."</em></div><br /><div><em></em></div><br /><div>I was immediately struck by the last line which was emboldened in the original email too. Why should teachers care about their failure rate more than the fact that these kids are losing an opportunity at life? Why are we reducing human life to numbers like wd codes and failure rates? Our school is usually a last chance stop for at-promise students and when they are withdrawn for truancy, they don't make it back to HS. They are done. </div><br /><div></div><br /><div>Now, its not our office manager's fault for the language she used (although I did send her a biting response). She only reflects the language of the instructors here. If we are more concerned that our student failure rate is low rather than a student's humanity then something is really wrong.</div><br /><div><em></em></div>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-8930661374274078172007-11-15T12:43:00.000-08:002007-11-15T13:07:44.991-08:00Reflections from Beyond BlogWorld<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSC8oHXnK6VCNVgQ6QgPyWXvpyr1sLRFnzM4SuIFItjQeCWPByQCqcAUnYeM2xgmHhpfDqImOJBme3OrMi7Ac4wC2FQKyTHEoztlxN1W3rx4IYqnO_yU54z2ewI2b8557jdX6NxVAW2bso/s1600-h/cocomment.gif"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5133176343961352530" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSC8oHXnK6VCNVgQ6QgPyWXvpyr1sLRFnzM4SuIFItjQeCWPByQCqcAUnYeM2xgmHhpfDqImOJBme3OrMi7Ac4wC2FQKyTHEoztlxN1W3rx4IYqnO_yU54z2ewI2b8557jdX6NxVAW2bso/s320/cocomment.gif" border="0" /></a><br /><div>Its been a week since the opening keynote at the Blog World Expo and some really cool things have begun happening as a result. I attended a session called <a href="http://docs.google.com/a/odysseyk12.org/Doc?id=dc3vfmgj_136ft3gvp"><em>Building an Online Community</em></a><strong><em> </em></strong>and picked up a valuable lesson; if you want to build a community of people who you correspond with then comment on their ideas. Now, I read a lot of blogs. I just never comment on them. I have been reading blogs to learn about education and some technology tools that will help me help my students but I figured most of the learning comes in the reading part, never thought about the commenting part. So, this week I started commenting on blogs and tracking my comments using an awesome program called <a href="http://cocomment.com/">coComment</a>.<strong><em> </em></strong></div><br /><div><strong><em></em></strong></div><br /><div>Here is why I love coComment. It helped me start a conversation with <a href="http://therandomthoughts.edublogs.org/about/">Louis Schmier</a>. He writes an edublog called <a href="http://therandomthoughts.edublogs.org/">Random Thoughts</a>. Some of his best posts, the posts I connected with the most are about his humanistic approach to students. For those of you who don't work in a high school you might think, well aren't all teachers humanistic, don't they all value kids, isn't that why they are teachers in the first place? No, no, and no. Thats one of the saddest enlightenments I've had in the past year, most teachers at my school don't really like kids. Sure they like the good ones, the smart ones. The ones that have failed and are labeled failures are still failures in the minds of many and the steps needed to give them the confidence to begin succeeding are rarely taken. Random Thoughts puts this a lot more eloquently than I do, and I thank coComment and Blog World for giving me the insight and confidence to start making thoughtful comments on thoughtful blog posts.</div><br /><div></div>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-6666265956750692152007-11-09T21:24:00.000-08:002007-11-09T21:33:38.454-08:00The Day I Almost Unofficially Met Mark Cuban.com<a href="http://mrplough07.blogspot.com/">Cross posted at The First Day of Kindergarten, a teacher-to-student blog</a><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPexFKv1i4tz58JIN7o8sabzmVUSvYh2TqMYdVhMBCtcT3BbNss34kfwBe5Njt8mSco49dNiTF3Av0CD7PRl4fW-Hg24o7kc8IIEVx1Iom7Ssi40yd2JX12mM_skKKbNeMEdeditjxkM0/s1600-h/blog+newbie+sticker.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPexFKv1i4tz58JIN7o8sabzmVUSvYh2TqMYdVhMBCtcT3BbNss34kfwBe5Njt8mSco49dNiTF3Av0CD7PRl4fW-Hg24o7kc8IIEVx1Iom7Ssi40yd2JX12mM_skKKbNeMEdeditjxkM0/s320/blog+newbie+sticker.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5131077323172438706" border="0" /></a>I almost got to ask <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mil8/1940784120/">Mark Cuban</a> a question today. If I would have, that means we might have almost unofficially met. He looked right at me...... I got nervous, but I was ready...... I thought for sure he was going to call on me....... but at the last second he passed. Off to the next man with his hand up. I don't feel sad, don't worry. I am a little disappointed though. He seems to know a lot about the internet, and I really wanted a quote from him to share with you, my students. Here is how the story goes.<br /><br />I was attending the <a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogworldexpo.com">Blog World Expo</a> which is the largest gathering of bloggers on the planet. DONT STOP READING NOW, this isnt all geeky. So anyway, I was sitting with 500 or so other bloggers at the closing <a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=define%3A+keynote&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS236US236">Keynote address</a> listening to internet guru Mr. Cuban (also owner of the Dallas Mavericks) about authentic <a href="http://www.blogmaverick.com/">blogging</a> and something struck me. I wonder if he has any visions for education? He knows a lot about business, a lot about basketball, tons and tons about the internet, what about education? A lot of our modern pioneers have visions for changing education to bring American students into the forefront of the information revolution and help them escape from the industrial one <a href="http://www.gatesfoundation.org/default.htm">(see Bill Gates)</a>. I wonder if Mr. Cuban does too? So, I thought, phrased, and garnished the nerve for 10 long minutes to ask him this one question:<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Considering that the public education system is light years behind the real world and blogging is almost nonexistent in schools, do you see any role for blogging and Web 2.0 in high schools?<span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span></span></span><br />My question is still out there to you Mr. Cuban. My students would love to hear your answer.<span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span></span></span>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-40382241727045325662007-11-09T13:26:00.000-08:002007-11-09T13:34:11.657-08:00Blogworld - NewMedia w/ Leo Laporte<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_2hZCcoHlHLRo3p5pl-KfuvQH8mTFzchYR_e4D1bAyp7TarkhmLA-f1J7Rzqvybh_UDCG4Pr0ovyETZoknXwLx20SDXhohIkvdY_PnAifgK30kYYB5TW5Hvb7xd7H82VTANcrhskFun4_/s1600-h/blogworldexpo+sign.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_2hZCcoHlHLRo3p5pl-KfuvQH8mTFzchYR_e4D1bAyp7TarkhmLA-f1J7Rzqvybh_UDCG4Pr0ovyETZoknXwLx20SDXhohIkvdY_PnAifgK30kYYB5TW5Hvb7xd7H82VTANcrhskFun4_/s320/blogworldexpo+sign.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5130956965303902882" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >New Media in the Internet</span><h3>Leo Laporte: <a title="TwitTv" href="http://twit.tv/" id="udh5">TwitTv</a> </h3><span style="font-style: italic;">Note: Please excuse the quality of writing, liveblogging.</span><br /><br />Came from mainstream media so he knows the old way = Your grandpa's media. In the old media if you wanted to have a voice, you had to have money to get it heard. In mainstream media, it was usually one guy telling you something. Now its changing, its in networks. We get to talk back now. We are creating media using blogs, podcasts, that dont cost any money and are influenced by our audience.<br /><br />He started '<a title="This Week in Tech" href="http://twit.tv/twit" id="apaw">This Week in Tech</a>' which is the #1 tech podcast on the internet. Uses Skype to interview for his shows but for the most part does this out of a cottage. He had 1/2 million in ad sales last year, doubling this year. This is a podcast folks. An mp3 or video recording put up online and sent out through a feed.<br /><br /><b>Its all about the conversation. No longer about one person directing the entire distribution of information. Its about people sharing. Sounds very much like the Socratic method in education. The conversation is directed through questions and answers from the community.<br /><br /></b><b><br /></b><b>Video</b> (and TV) appeals to your monkey mind, the non-rational, non cerebral part of your mind and is designed to stimulate emotions. Look at the comments on Youtube, they are moronic.<br /><br /><b>Blogging</b> is good for the rational part of the mind. Comments are often thoughtful and part of a conversation. Sometimes the bloggers personality doesn't show through completely so their <i>ideas</i> are at the forefront.<br /><b>Audio</b> is intimate. You are talking into the mind through the ear. Audio is very good at abstract ideas because it doesn't rely on pictures to get a message across. Audio allows you to promote your personality along with your ideas.<br /><br /><br />Think of yourself as creating content. Not a podcaster which focuses on the medium of delivery, but as a content creator.<br /><br />The Babble Objection- If "everyone" is blogging and "everyone" is podcasting, who is listening? Turns out a lot of people are according to Leo.<br /><br /><br />We can all be our own solar systems. Our goal shouldn't be to get on CNN. Our goal should be to be a hub of our own world, our own community. ex. If you do a show/blog about woodworking, you should strive to be a hub about woodworking. Then use your acquaintances to branch out to other hubs that are related and then will draw people into your system. Its all about dialogue, and community, and connections.Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-57367847527248200162007-11-08T08:58:00.000-08:002007-11-08T09:32:32.173-08:00Blog World 07 Opening Keynote<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2_JofX0r_6muQyA2MZrojpp__i-6Uk_W9qizpXe2YHwn4-DaCFkuk_WlX6e8KfF3-UntyzUlFS8chho0G6-q9dML5FI1CFN6P-XCFd6D8dl1qMQ4Xbh5cFSNc_NxOWM_v9Zc_mH_I3Cao/s1600-h/wordpress.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2_JofX0r_6muQyA2MZrojpp__i-6Uk_W9qizpXe2YHwn4-DaCFkuk_WlX6e8KfF3-UntyzUlFS8chho0G6-q9dML5FI1CFN6P-XCFd6D8dl1qMQ4Xbh5cFSNc_NxOWM_v9Zc_mH_I3Cao/s320/wordpress.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5130518797035332226" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Note: This is live, please excuse the quality of writing.<br /><br /></span>I'm sitting here at Blog World Expo with about 300-400 people listening to <a href="http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&safe=off&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS236US236&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&ct=result&cd=1&q=Ed+Sussman+%22mansueto+digital%22&spell=1">Ed Sussman</a> interview <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Mullenweg">Matt Mullenweg</a> the founder of Wordpress as the opening keynote session.<br />It's pretty cool how the world has changed and geeks are really cool now. At least in my world, but in a lot of other people's also.<br /><br /><a href="http://photomatt.net/">PhotoMatt </a>is Mullenweg's blog.<br /><br /><br />Q: What makes a compelling blog?<br /><br />A: Passionate content. Uniqueness.<br /><br />What Matt loves about blogging is when he says something dumb someone tells him. People don't tell you face to face, but he loves the comments section of his blog because people are frank and it gives him perspective.<br /><br />If people make an interesting comment on his blog, he will often go back to that person's blog. If you comment, it helps your work get noticed. This is news for me because I only comment on one blog. If I really want to get my ideas out there than I need to comment and get better with my labels.<br /><br />Talking about why he likes the Craigslist model. He asked Craig why there was no advertising on his site and Craig responded "Because the users didn't ask for it." That's a really interesting comment. If you can run something with user influence as the main source of reasoning, that's fantastic.Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-73404064741437068572007-11-07T10:07:00.000-08:002007-11-07T10:12:28.886-08:00VSS 07- First Presentation<img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5130161941420704098" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3lpXoZBrH0B1qqA-S_Fsqr7gO1RyXhSflYB_-gakl_Lv3W5iRkjewHNwBKMTGFAGad2rLEaSUJ9xO54hRXi-b5m3x34lh1SSF9muKQBRq-bnPYjtu7MEUFyX8ldjlVOdjj8Luje2OGqcN/s320/peoplefindergraph.jpg" border="0" />A small group of teachers from my school presented at the <a href="http://www.nacol.org/events/vss/">Virtual Schools Symposium</a> this week. We discussed how we are using Social Networks and Web 2.0 tools in our courses. The presentation went pretty well, check out our wiki below if you want to see it. That was the highlight of the conference for me, many of the sessions were vendor driven and since I dont make policy decisions, or influence purchasing at my charter school there wasn't a lot of sessions left that fit for me. Note: Remind me to get some sleep the night before my next presentation.<br /><div><br /><a href="https://wiki.odysseyk12.org/vss2007">Embrace Myspace: Safe Uses of Social Networking and Web 2.0 tools</a></div>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-52222704338481422292007-10-31T13:59:00.001-07:002007-10-31T14:01:04.318-07:00All I Ever Wanted to Know about Dieting I Learned at Work<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr51ZjPf2_SlOBY5QLGLY2pPRdrv5Pe3BffaICibl4yldWZOJSwXQbXs9ZBBRMGK5BVO6PdAB0_fLTgUxUC6cJNmJZDqoQMj9SRMITVsCh2hGmMZH19bpFqEbGtKpgargBFv43OHsS0SBI/s1600-h/weight+measuringtapemouth.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5127608591953166642" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr51ZjPf2_SlOBY5QLGLY2pPRdrv5Pe3BffaICibl4yldWZOJSwXQbXs9ZBBRMGK5BVO6PdAB0_fLTgUxUC6cJNmJZDqoQMj9SRMITVsCh2hGmMZH19bpFqEbGtKpgargBFv43OHsS0SBI/s320/weight+measuringtapemouth.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><div><br />I have learned so much about Weight Watchers, dress sizes, plus sizes, counting carbs, fat grams, and points this year at work that I wont ever have to watch Oprah again.<br /><br />Not that I'm opposed to learning, Im just not so sure dieting should be the number one topic on a high school campus. Not even moaning about administration overtakes diettalk for the #1 spot. Now what kind of school is this?<br /><br />In addition to dieting I was lucky enough to listen to teachers booking travel plans over the phone, getting tickets to hear a political speech, and planning their party/outing tonight. What I didnt hear was one teacher calling students and discussing how they can do help them do better in their courses in the 2nd quarter. hmmm,<br /><br />Yes, I know, Im whining. This is a HS after all.</div>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-38777210384863330442007-10-15T17:04:00.000-07:002007-10-29T16:28:07.080-07:00Accessibility in Online Classes<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxd3giInp0Q32ERhn53Rp422lVC-AFxRqHhIolXVZsyZ4tZz3O6cj53mrTP2uQe2RfcCnvzT3_3RbZZwEgsh6WaAGXdKzjZGM92xs6d1V1AzKPtY5fstElUHGdGuIjpxd1Z2ZohgJWI47R/s1600-h/labyrinth.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxd3giInp0Q32ERhn53Rp422lVC-AFxRqHhIolXVZsyZ4tZz3O6cj53mrTP2uQe2RfcCnvzT3_3RbZZwEgsh6WaAGXdKzjZGM92xs6d1V1AzKPtY5fstElUHGdGuIjpxd1Z2ZohgJWI47R/s200/labyrinth.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5121743206016312210" border="0" /></a><br /><br />There are some fundamental accessibility problems at our online school. High School students, and students of all ages for that matter, have trouble navigating online courses. So, if we know that, why don't we make it easier for them? Are we trying to trick them? Are we trying to exude power by playing guessing games? It's simple, they will learn more of the actual content if we take the time to include some fundamental basics when constructing our courses. Below are 5 tips for making your online coursework more accessible.<br /><br />1. Lesson Introductions - Most of our online teachers do not include this basic part to a good lesson plan. The introduction, or what I call the hook, has to somehow connect what kids are about to learn to what they already know. Building your lesson to connect to their background knowledge is the first rung on a ladder to creating schema organization in long term memory. It also gives the lesson relevancy and motivates students by tying into what they already know or like.<br /><br />2. Be Brief but Organized - We have all been to a website where you scroll down further and further, seemingly never coming to an end of the webpage. If you do that in an online lesson the kids are gone, done before they ever begin. Lessons have to be constructed in small, organized parts without including pages worth of material on one webpage.<br /><br />3. Requirements - Tell the students what you want them to do. For example, if you are sending the student to a link outside of your webpage then tell them what to do once they get there. Be specific, tell them exactly what to read and sometimes what to ignore. Also, when the student is completing a project or written assignment, you should include the exact requirements of what they need to understand for that assessment.<br /><br />4. Student Samples- Try to provide student samples. We do this in a regular class, why wouldn't we do it online? All of my courses utilize <a href="http://civilliberties.wikispaces.com/">a wiki</a> that my students have created and host to show off quality work.<br /><br />5. Don't hide things from our kids- If you want HS kids to find what you want them to learn, put it right in front of them. Don't make them go to one page to find a password or another to find what you are going to assess them on. Don't get me wrong, it's okay to have links that shoot the kids off to content, but don't make accessing the content a labyrinth they have to navigate. Its difficult enough for kids to just complete the assignments in an online course, don't try to teach them how to be successful scavenger hunters to do that.<br /><br />Many of us believe the way we have set up our courses is spot on. Are we paying attention to the signs that student's are giving us that tell us they aren't?Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-27365526340865739052007-10-15T16:53:00.000-07:002007-10-15T16:59:14.046-07:00Educational Technology CarnivalI wanted to thank <a href="http://globalvirtual.blogspot.com/">Global Citizenship in a Virtual World</a> for featuring two of my blog posts in their recent Ed Tech Carnival. They are picking up steam over there and have some great postings in this collection.<br /><a href="http://globalvirtual.blogspot.com/2007/10/2nd-educational-technology-blog.html"><br />2nd Edition of the Educational Technology Carnival</a>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-44409960976504549392007-10-11T13:40:00.000-07:002007-10-11T14:33:03.707-07:00Does Communication Equate to Attendance?<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOUCIiEglSuSgeRhUALTppgD92xlMP6iu4eCvQv3NLbwB-EN8u_cauFIJwj_jkKgF6i9O8DaLJiV4gWZeTGZ9nhX0xIyTSkCZdzYiIQ4ouHSpPnNkQWPtPaAWkte15D6YI3u09wXrq2eGP/s1600-h/heartache.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5120188741387772706" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOUCIiEglSuSgeRhUALTppgD92xlMP6iu4eCvQv3NLbwB-EN8u_cauFIJwj_jkKgF6i9O8DaLJiV4gWZeTGZ9nhX0xIyTSkCZdzYiIQ4ouHSpPnNkQWPtPaAWkte15D6YI3u09wXrq2eGP/s200/heartache.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBvCZRwt4cmaGJm17uRwFgNERV-AWutF3PODbMkZfeYQhA7Mv33zp-4sVeKF-_FVAmAfFW3y7dblX0VzKEdqQ4XP0ncrP07s4Jnzad3pHgYEk1vK0alq9F3iUMEhJeicjP1cpWcGsgINz1/s1600-h/heartache.jpg"></a><br /><br /><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBvCZRwt4cmaGJm17uRwFgNERV-AWutF3PODbMkZfeYQhA7Mv33zp-4sVeKF-_FVAmAfFW3y7dblX0VzKEdqQ4XP0ncrP07s4Jnzad3pHgYEk1vK0alq9F3iUMEhJeicjP1cpWcGsgINz1/s1600-h/heartache.jpg"></a><br /><br /><br /><div>We have a very high at-promise population at my charter school. It wouldn't be a stretch to say that 90% of our kids are at serious risk for not completing HS. This is the time of the year when it really starts to get scary. It seems that the initial burst out of the gate wears off right around week 5 (we are in week 7 now) and student's start missing class. Early on attendance is up but then they hit a wall. They just stop showing up. So far this year that hasn't been true in my courses, but its still true in other classes on campus. It got me <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0RUlOnO733jx8sYHaHJ_q4oiTbQXQfUTrm5nskeh_sCQ6iyzcGbhcIaZ_G2UZxXULaNsZamqHa6J1ttpl6R3QlecAGuJmSKu1dpDl5YdyNVYGiQt7YstAckxTSayY4XEgd_H77w8NIZNY/s1600-h/heartache.jpg"></a>thinking. If I'm getting 80-100% attendance everyday but many teachers are only getting 40-80% attendance everyday, is there a relationship somehow. I've made some formal and casual observations through substituting and observing classes throughout the day and I see this pattern a lot. A theory has started to form..... The teachers that spend a lot of time tracking students academic achievement, which includes knowing almost every detail of their coursework, monitoring grades bi-weekly, and calling home on a regular basis, seem to have better attendance. The kids whose teachers are much more blase about tracking progress and calling home have lower attendance numbers. Well, thats my hypothesis anyway. I wonder if it could be true.</div><br /><br /><div>It would be really interesting to break down attendance numbers by teacher and compare that to the amount of time each teacher spends monitoring students to see if my hypothesis could become a theory (shout out to my 7th grade science teacher for teaching me the difference). Too bad I can't do that. Its pretty invasive and calls for a lot of formal judgment on my part and probably wouldn't lead to any change at our school anyway. So for now, I will just continue to watch most students fall through the cracks but hope that the work a few great teachers at my school are doing can save enough. Oh yeah, one of my goals for this year is to stay positive so I'm writing this entry with a smile on face to counter balance the negativity in the last paragraph.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0RUlOnO733jx8sYHaHJ_q4oiTbQXQfUTrm5nskeh_sCQ6iyzcGbhcIaZ_G2UZxXULaNsZamqHa6J1ttpl6R3QlecAGuJmSKu1dpDl5YdyNVYGiQt7YstAckxTSayY4XEgd_H77w8NIZNY/s1600-h/heartache.jpg"></a></div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBvCZRwt4cmaGJm17uRwFgNERV-AWutF3PODbMkZfeYQhA7Mv33zp-4sVeKF-_FVAmAfFW3y7dblX0VzKEdqQ4XP0ncrP07s4Jnzad3pHgYEk1vK0alq9F3iUMEhJeicjP1cpWcGsgINz1/s1600-h/heartache.jpg"></a><br /><br /><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0RUlOnO733jx8sYHaHJ_q4oiTbQXQfUTrm5nskeh_sCQ6iyzcGbhcIaZ_G2UZxXULaNsZamqHa6J1ttpl6R3QlecAGuJmSKu1dpDl5YdyNVYGiQt7YstAckxTSayY4XEgd_H77w8NIZNY/s1600-h/heartache.jpg"></a></div></div></div>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-52294248298736686002007-10-10T11:25:00.000-07:002007-10-10T11:50:36.213-07:00Motivating Student Creativity ArticleI've written an article that will be posted in the Techlearning E-Zine in the spring. It's a short piece with 2 central themes. The first theme is the idea of options. It's important that teachers provide students with options for completing assignments. Of course this isn't practical for all assignments since we are often trying to teach them something with the method of assessment. However, most assignments in secondary education are essays and traditional objective based assessments. Communication and information in the beloved 'real world' isn't based on those methods anymore. Essays certainly play a role but not the central role in communicating ideas in the Web 2.0 world that our kids occupy. Which is my segue to the 2nd theme, using Web 2.0 tools in my courses. In other words, allowing students to use project based tools that are valid to the world they live in will promote creativity, motivation, and 21st century literacy.<br /><a href="http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dhsgv8zv_15sdkhcm">http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dhsgv8zv_15sdkhcm</a>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-59134811749095039072007-10-08T14:30:00.001-07:002007-10-08T14:43:13.528-07:00Playing with MoneyI read a prompt on <a href="http://www.brickfish.com/Default.aspx">Brickfish</a> the other day. It said "sum up a politician using visuals that represent parts of a mathematical formula." The final slide is at the bottom of the page, but first check out my <a href="http://www.slideshare.net/crookedmind/presdential-summation">SlideShare version</a>.<br /><br />Then I took 13 of the pics and told the same story in an <a href="http://animoto.com/play/54b965964ff2f24a58c953baa0bb307a">Animoto Video</a>:<br /><br />Then I had to pick one slide and submit it to the contest. 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PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: middle; PADDING-TOP: 0px; BORDER-BOTTOM: none; background-color:rgb(255,255,255)" valign="middle"><a href="http://www.brickfish.com/FlashServices/ClickToContent.frss?cc=2_350413_95055194_103_-1_154&htid=40fdb9f3-9fe6-47d8-9f7e-8d2fbfef42ab&isep=1&pbapi=147244&pbvi=5496209" target="_blank"><img style="display:block;" src="http://www.brickfish.com/Media/Images/general/buttons/b_checkitoutstatic.gif" border="0" /></a></td><td style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: middle; PADDING-TOP: 0px; BORDER-BOTTOM: none"><img style="display:block;" src="http://www.brickfish.com/Media/Images/Propagation/R_White.gif" width="12" height="103" /></td></tr><tr style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: middle; PADDING-TOP: 0px; BORDER-BOTTOM: none"><td style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: middle; PADDING-TOP: 0px; BORDER-BOTTOM: none"><img style="display:block;" src="http://www.brickfish.com/Media/Images/Propagation/BL.gif" /></td><td style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: middle; PADDING-TOP: 0px; BORDER-BOTTOM: none"><img style="display:block;" src="http://www.brickfish.com/Media/Images/Propagation/Bottom_White.gif" width="242" height="12" /></td><td style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: middle; PADDING-TOP: 0px; BORDER-BOTTOM: none"><img style="display:block;" src="http://www.brickfish.com/Media/Images/Propagation/Bottom_White.gif" width="71" height="12" /></td><td style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; VERTICAL-ALIGN: middle; PADDING-TOP: 0px; BORDER-BOTTOM: none"><img style="display:block;" src="http://www.brickfish.com/Media/Images/Propagation/BR.gif" /></td></tr></table>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-18694677232322283672007-10-03T19:45:00.000-07:002007-10-03T19:59:31.489-07:00Don't Despair<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5cv8JPC-uym4p4X_cgUfSmtl4VsrO3SL8lAV1Dg7WqUJLnyhBNHkEr8yiZcVskJDc2x7kRhqMXVXP_itIlbVGj06b4hicaTU4pgpAY-8Mx_8aui1eakSjtYYT8aeEirZPT_G77OWFwP3-/s1600-h/542200~Beavis-and-Butthead-School-Sucks-Posters.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5cv8JPC-uym4p4X_cgUfSmtl4VsrO3SL8lAV1Dg7WqUJLnyhBNHkEr8yiZcVskJDc2x7kRhqMXVXP_itIlbVGj06b4hicaTU4pgpAY-8Mx_8aui1eakSjtYYT8aeEirZPT_G77OWFwP3-/s200/542200~Beavis-and-Butthead-School-Sucks-Posters.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5117310778292003538" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Don't despair even though the numbers aren't there. This is still going to be the best year ever. Okay, what do I mean? Well last Friday we submitted unsats for each of our classes. Any students with a 'd' or 'f' in any course would receive an unsatisfactory notice home. Our Assiss. Principal ran the numbers today and here is what we got. 726 students, 650 receiving at least one unsat, 76 with none. That means, hold on let me get out my trusty windows calculator, 89.5% are not passing at least one class 6 weeks into the school year. I like to think of it this way, 10% are passing every one of their courses, yayyyy!<br /><br />Pretty disparaging. So why am I optimistic? Change takes time. We have implemented drastic changes to our school from the way we deliver our content to the methods we communicate with our kids. Its a HUGE change and we are only 6 weeks into the year. I know that I'm doing more than Ive ever done before, and I trust that is going to save more kids from dropping and failing out than Ive saved in previous years. There are a couple of us doing this, we will make a big difference to our students. Other teachers will begin to make the necessary changes, jump on the bandwagon so to speak, as we get into the school year further. They just need a little time, but not too much time because students drop like flies at our school. Also, they may need some not so gentle nudging from admin. I know some of us who are maxed out would like to see some swift kicks to those who waste sooooooooo much time. It's obvious to us admin, just ask. <img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/Cory/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot-3.jpg" alt="" />Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-85104085882341299782007-09-28T22:40:00.000-07:002008-02-13T08:04:51.179-08:00Alone<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiw7yY8Yr8qQDal7fIa2oZo-B2EwMIS_aLYst0FPY-52VBbF7HHS0kwtXriqNBvqVDeeeE4MmPBRhCHSB-Lbh8CoUETUUFBheZZ0tJgrutYPbIbOmaZObTnH1bvJ1jFmWl5bLVVhvWLSAUl/s1600-h/buddha.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiw7yY8Yr8qQDal7fIa2oZo-B2EwMIS_aLYst0FPY-52VBbF7HHS0kwtXriqNBvqVDeeeE4MmPBRhCHSB-Lbh8CoUETUUFBheZZ0tJgrutYPbIbOmaZObTnH1bvJ1jFmWl5bLVVhvWLSAUl/s200/buddha.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5115500956382880418" border="0" /></a><br />The weirdest thing happened to me this morning. I was driving to work, listening to NPR as usual, and I hit the magic BBM spot. Behind Black Mountain. Around here that means NPR goes out for a few miles, no other station does, but NPR does, maybe because its public. Anyway, I switched over to the one other station in Vegas I dare listen to, the pop station which has the #1 morning show. It was a commercial. I looked at my radio, gasped, took a deep breath and pushed the power button. It was about 6:45 in the morning and when the radio went off the only sounds I could hear were the ones coming from my tires bouncing, pot holes and all, along these desert highways. And the whoosh of cars passing me at 80mph. Then something interesting happened.<br /> I started to get panicky and wondered why. Then, in a split, mind numbing moment of clarity I realized where my anxiety was coming from. It was the first time I had the radio off in 4 years of driving this route. Maybe longer, cant remember the last time I turned the radio off and just listened..... just.....thought.<br /> Well, for the first 10 minutes I tried to convince myself I could make it through this new experiment. The anxiety was overwhelming, whats wrong with me? I tried to focus on something to help me get through the silence. I kept thinking about a thought I hadn't finished from last night, <a href="http://thisteacherrants.blogspot.com/2007/09/professional-podomatic-er.html">how Podcasts could help my kids?</a><br /> I couldn't focus, couldnt come up with anything. All kinds of thoughts went in and out of my mind, but nothing productive. I took a couple deep breaths, tried to envelope the silence, and then just went with it. Go with the flow Cheech and Chong always said, or some unproductive person, cant quite remember who. Anyway, I went with it. All of sudden swarms of clarity came to me. Thoughts of making my classes better, posting on blogs, communicating with at-risk students, all these thoughts hit me. Of course the only thing I didnt think of was another way to use podcasts in my courses besides students making audio essays, but I did come to one clear resolution.<br /> Monks are smart. Take time to meditate. Its almost impossible for me but the unnerving silence of this morning was the only point of relaxation I had all day.Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2684967488114338238.post-71198138260736989752007-09-27T19:26:00.000-07:002007-09-27T19:37:02.081-07:00Professional Podomatic-erNot really. I made my first podcast today. I used <a href="http://audacity.sourceforge.net/">Audacity</a> software and uploaded it to <a href="http://podomatic.com/">Podomatic</a>. Podomatic's MP3 recorder didn't work for the first 4 days I went to the site, so finally had to break down and get Audacity, upload the special <a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=lame_enc.dll&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS236US236">LAME d.ll file</a>, and get it operating. After a few hours of working on my first pod, which only took 5 minutes to actually record, I'm tired. But, I learned the program and put something up. Now lets see how I can use this in my courses.<br /><br />First guess is to let students do audio essays posted online at Podomatic. They could do this for virtually any essay based assignment. Hmmm, will put some thought into what else and post it at The First Day of Kindergarten when I'm ready. If you have any suggestions, comment below.<br /><br />Oh yeah, I'm super excited about the <a href="http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=120">K12onlineconference</a>. Already booked some time on my Outlook calendar. <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1185/1438944952_44eaeed2ba.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px;" src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1185/1438944952_44eaeed2ba.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Cory Ploughhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10961407128890788676noreply@blogger.com0