Mr. Pruett’s Blog

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Interview with Scott

Follow the above link to hear an interview conducted between Scott and Donovan on 2/8/08.�

Hindsight is 20/20.  Though, if we fast forward to the year 2020 and gaze upon the past, educators will truly see the fruits of all our technological labor.  Take this crazy scenario for a typical Monday in February of that year…

First I arrive at school in my hybrid hydrogen-electric car made by J.A.C.K. (Jaguar, Audi, Chrysler, Kia, a division of Toyota.)  I dock the car, check with the office, walk to the classroom and prepare for student bodies and students via sataillite for distant learning and home schooling.  The bell rings and students pile in the room (I confiscate a couple three-ring binders from students who forgot to turn off their images on the cover.)  We begin by having all students pull out their laptops, which are convienently priced at about $20 in 2008 dollars.  Students begin with a warm up blog on three fascinating things they did over the weekend.  Next, today’s lesson focuses around the geography of the Middle East, so…ready everyone?  Suzie, pass out the virtual reality headsets so we can truly feel (”imagine” is such an old fashioned word) sand blowing in our faces and up our noses at it really would in a sandstorm.  Students, smell the salty air as you dip a toe in the Red Sea.  OK, now your assignment…type a paragraph about why you think living in these conditions would be tough if the year was 600.  This discussion will eventually segway into our unit on Islam. �

Sounds pretty exciting.  To borrow an oft-used phrase…the future looks bright indeed.�

Will Richardson’s book discusses several shifts in educational technology in the coming years.  Of the 10 he writes about, my comments center around #1, #5, and #6. 

Paramount to the basic function of the internet is the information placed on it.  That information is placed there for a variety of reasons; one surely being for teachers to use in the classroom.  Gone are the days where the main option for classroom materials was the textbook, a couple videos, and perhaps other print media (newspapers, magazines, etc.) Need to research local news?  Go to their website.  Need to research the differences between systolic and dyastolic in blood pressure but don’t have your textbook?  Log on.  The teachers can also ease your suffering of finding an appropriate website with a helpful page of pre-approved links. 

Concerning #5, this quote sums up my beliefs from pg. 129: “In the past, when information was not as accessible, it was important to memorize facts and formulas.  Today however, factual answers are only a couple clicks away. “  One can surmise that rote memorization (not ideally the best way to learn) no longer carries the same value it had only a few years ago.  Only need a fact in your short term memory?  Here is the big shift for you.

Lastly, there big shift #6, a real imperative one to remember.  Students and teachers alike can not and should not assume the information they ingest online has been throughly proofread or even accurate.  Unless you’re relying on a .gov or .mil site, a cautious reader should raise an eyebrow to just about everything else.  “Reading has become an more active undertaking” means not only do you have to consume it for knowledge, but also for validity.      �

There are several internet sites a person can explore to upload images onto the world wide web.  Yahoo!’s Flickr comes to mind.  Flickr has a convienent interface to upload photos of grandma’s 90th birthday or your daughter’s first place finish in the school jog-a-thon; whatever you like.  It can also support opportunities in the classroom.  Pictures of completed class group projects can be posted so parents can see what’s going on in their son/daughter’s classroom, without leaving the living room.  Furthermore, for history classes, a folder can be made where students can submit pictures of interesting places they or their parents have been in the world, even possibly relating to the unit at hand (an example could be if the unit is Renaissance and the topic is Shakespeare, some students might have been to the Globe Theatre in England.) 

Downsides are obvious.  This is the world wide web, so unless you set your Flickr account to ultra sensitive, anyone can download and save pictures for possibly malicious purposes.  Then there’s parents.  Imagining a parent storming into my classroom demanding a picture of their little Suzie be taken off the ‘net because she’s not color coordinated (she’s wearing lavender instead of magenta!) is not outside the realm of possibility.Â

Recently there has been renewed discussion on the origins/gravesite of the Mona Lisa…not so much the painting as the real person behind it.  Experts have been arguing about the damsel in de’ painting for eons, some even debating if she ever walked this Earth.  To date, the two most common theories revolve around Lisa being some type of twisted transgendered mockup of Leonardo Da Vinci himself, or, she’s actually Lisa Gherardini Giocondo, the 23-year old sweetheart of the powerful Gherardini family in Florence.  

Now that its February, my students are beginning their trek through the Renaissance like previous students did before them.  Though on one particiular day coming up, I’m trying something different.  I want them to research a topic that is both a big event in history, AND still making headlines.  What better then Mrs. Giocondo, who’s still making news centuries after her supposed death?

Here’s a hypothetical scenario (details still need to be worked out.)  Using, del.icio.us, I can bookmark important news articles and sites (nothing too specific, I still want them to hunt a little.)  Fox News?  Check.  CNN?  Check.  Reuters and the Associated Press?  Double check, (this is probably where the first two get their stories on Lisa anyway).  Next, if time permits, students could find other articles using their del.icio.us accounts.   Once the resources are squared away, students will then have to choose four articles, read them, and determine a certain amount of fact vs. speculation, looking for key words or phrases.  It’s great for differentiation because even though the topic for the assignment is the same (Lisa,) they are working very independently and taking divergent paths to come to the same conclusion of the assignment.    So, stay tuned.              Â

It’s now several days post experiment, and after working out some initial bugs, I think pbwiki.com can have a lot of potential in the classroom.  Trying to not make this a winded explanation, here’s what the students did on Monday the 28th:

1) Class was divided into two large groups of 15-18 students with their desks arranged in large circles

2) Using one laptop per group, students login to pbwiki.com and navigate their way to “paralleltimeline” wiki

3) Each group opens a wiki with the same set of 20 important events from world history spanning 300B.C. to 1300 (e.g. King John signs the Magna Carta).  No exact years for the events are given and they are randomly sorted.

4) One group is given the task of deleting the events from the fall of the Roman Empire or before.    In other words, what events don’t belong?  The person with the laptop is the only one in charge of making the deletion.  The students need to decide as a group what the student with the laptop should delete.  Once deleted they’re not allowed to undo or retype mistakes.   

5) The other team does the same thing, only instead concentrating on events that occurred after the Fall of the Roman Empire.

6) After time is called, students click save and we reveal which side is more correct or if there’s a tie.  A timeline activity then follows, based on the events they chose. 

Pros for this activity:

- Excellent group activity.  Many students were heavily engaged in voting which events to delete.  All had to participate in some way (including the deadbeats) because eventually the laptop would make its way around to all students. Only involving two laptops can be a blessing.

Cons for the activity:

- Due to time restrictions (one 49-minute class period) students were not allowed to add any info to the wiki, just deleting. 

- Can be a loud activity depending on the behavior of the class on a normal day. 

- Two laptops might be a blessing, but not very imaginative (but this activity can be altered to incorporate teams working on a wiki rather then groups).   �

Right now it’s Saturday night, around the 8 o’clock hour and I am comfortably parked on the couch in the family room.  Running through my mind as I type this are thoughts on the events of the day (The mountains were scenic today.  Why did I buy a home in 2005, the worst year possible?  My gut instinct says the undefeated Patriots are not going to win.)  Somewhere else up there are probing thoughts of whether or not the wiki project I conjoured up last week will actually fly when the students try it on Jan. 28th.  Overall the students this year are great kids; rarely do I have to bother with negative phone calls home or the quintessential student referrel to the AP.   But, are these kids ready for a wacky wiki wunderday?  I tried to design all of the bugs out of it; went to the site several times, memorized the best path for the students to take, etc.  We’ll see what the 28th holds besides the chance for rain.  Stay tuned.     Â

If I ever ran into an administrator who refused to let me establish and manage a blog for my classes, my first comment would be to ask why she insists on keeping learning opportunities for students in the 20th century.  Blogs are a clever and creative way to keep tech savvy students on the boil, and teachers as well.  While it may be difficult to start a blogging system with students, blogging contains several benefits according to the book, “Blogs, Wikis, and Podcasts” by Will Richardson.  Trees are saved; papers never get lost; extra copies need not be available for disorganized students; everything is electronically saved, time stamped and archived; the World Wide Web as an audience to showcase student work rather then a refridgerator door; students take true ownership of their work; expands typing skills; potentially lowers the filter for EL students; blogs won’t disappear at the end of the school year; and on and on. 

Blogging can aid in differentiating instruction as well.  Suppose the standard students need to learn is “Causes of the Civil War.”  The 20th century model might include various worksheets on individual causes (i.e. Compromise of 1832 and 1850, Dred Scott, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, etc.) with other mundane activities thrown in.  In a potential 21st century model, students can be placed in groups or partners and given a cause to investigate, then let loose using the ‘net.  Once they have completed their research, they can post and collaborate with the other teams via a wiki.  The teacher then can also include an assignment where students have to critique other teams work, and assign grades.Â

Sample video of my 2nd per. students hard at work.  Most didn’t even realize I was recording them.

classroom-sample.wmv