Seeking the Wisdom of the Ages Through Our Student’s Eyes

Oh the sounds of summer…The crack of the bat (or ping if you’re talking about Little League). The pop of a ball being caught in the pocket of a leathery glove. The swishing sound of feet gliding across orange clay. These are sounds I grew up with for 15 years. My true formative years. Memories that to this day I can remember very vividly.

How many of you remember going out and “playing catch” with your dad? Or kicking around that soccer ball with your brother or sister in the backyard? Better yet, how many of you played whiffle ball or cup ball with your friends at a park, on the street or even in your swimming pool?

I for one can say yes to all of the above. I so cherished the time I was able to spend time with dad to play catch in the side yard. He would get all gussied up in the catchers gear that we had as part of my Little League team. As I got older, the more equipment he seemed to put on. By the time I was in the Senior Division (14-15 year old) in Little League he was in full catching equipment and double batting gloves under the catcher’s mitt. I’ve even had the true cool experience to play softball as a 19 year old with my dad and grandfather on the same team for two seasons. Nothing cooler than having 3 generations of Turners on the same field at the same time. We get to do that occasionally for golf, but the frequency is alot less now that my Grandfather’s Parkinson’s is really prohibitive these days.

The point is, I’ve been blessed with the fortunes of living a very active youth (we won’t mention how its gone downhill from graduation now will we?) The question is, where did this love of playing come from? Where was the spark? Sure, my parents encouraged me to play Little League. Heck, my dad was my coach from my 6 y/o Tee Ball first team, all the way to my 15 y/o Senior Division Team.

No matter what activity it is, the ability to succeed at these activities requires 2 things. Repetition and Practice. The two go together. How often do you see a big league ball player hitting in the batting cages? Pretty often I’m sure. I know when I was playing ball, I practice everyday. The routine is still etched in my head. We did infield/outfield fungo drills, followed by baserunning drills, then hitting practice (cage or game type situations or live bp) finished up with cardio/strength training exercises.

Again, I had the luxury of being able to practice extra to hone my skills. But where were the primary skills taught? Where are these primary skills taught today? What individuals are in charge of teaching our young children these life skills of being active and learning through sport and play? Those physical educators that you see coming and going with the nice sun tan, floppy hat and the sun glasses hanging either from their neck or sitting on their cap. I have a very soft spot in my heart for PE teachers. Little known secret, my initial teaching certificate is in physical education from the University of Central Florida. I’ve had to deal with for years being told that I took the ‘easy’ route to becoming an educator. “PFFFT”, I tell them. I won’t get into the ins and outs of what a physical education major program looks like at the college level. You can do your own research on that.

Back to the kids though and their PE curriculum…

I’ve shared at length my desire to see more gaming in the educational setting. The same can be said for the physical education curriculum for an elementary age child. We lived by a motto/creed at UCF. “Monkey See Monkey Do, Children Learn the Best as they are Doing.” The goal of any PE curriculum is to have the children actively engaged at ALL times. Movement, movement, movement. Active, active, active. Two things occur when this sort of engagement is not occurring: there is no retention of the activity that is being learned and there is a HIGH probability that the children will begin to misbehave.

Does this result sound vaguely familiar? All to often I’ve walked into classrooms where students are proverbially ‘bouncing off the wall’. It is not in my place to tell these teachers how to do their job. However, it is well within my role as a technology integration specialist to offer suggestions for engaging students. Why then do we not see as many brick and mortar classrooms being run similarly to those out on the PE fields?

My mind is swirling now that it is 2 am in the morning. I’ve been churning this topic in my head since I returned back from New York last week. I think it’s high time for me to hit the sack and return to this on Saturday when I return home.

Seeking the Wisdom of the Ages…

Tom.

photo courtesy of: jimmywayne22, “Howard J. Lamade Stadium.” Flickr. 27 July 2008. 1 Aug 2008 <http://www.flickr.com/photos/61278305@N00/2706681401/>.

Ok….so it’s only a few weeks late. But I was able to truly let what I gained from my NECC 2008 experience sink in while sitting on a boat in the 1000 islands and enjoying family time while in Niagara Falls. It is a shame that vacation will come to an end for me tomorrow, as I fly back to Orlando tomorrow at noon. (ok, so I started this on Monday and finished it tonight)

As with last year, I spent most of my time in the Blogger’s Cafe’. It’s always nice to see many of the people that I feel are like-minded in our zest for improved student learning. I did have HIGH expectations/hopes leading into NECC with regards to sessions and the learning that I was about to embark upon. Being the procrastinator at heart that I am, I did not do any pre-reading of the conference schedule. That would have made too much sense, i.e. that’s not me. I started reading the conference schedule book received with the registration packet and was quickly dismayed. Like my FETC (Florida Educational Technology Conference) experience in January, I found that many of the sessions in my opinion were geared for the mid-ranged adapter to newer adapter. Please don’t misunderstand, there is a need for these types of sessions, however, they are not for me. I saw myself quickly going back to presenters that I’ve seen in the past, and enjoy learning from (i.e. David Jakes/Dean Shareski, David Warlick, Hall Davidson, Chris Lehmann). Not sure if this makes me a gomer or a homer or guilty of living inside a professional development bubble. I just know that many a session I snuck in on was not compelling.

My large goal for NECC this year was two-fold: How can I create better professional development opportunities for my teachers and how can I become a better TV Production Coordinator. I think I was successful on both ends. Having been told pretty much that PD for my teachers will be at a premium (read: non-existant), so I will need to be creative in my approaches. I will definitely be keeping to my working with specific teachers that express willingness to take the step towards tech integration. Through the DEN pre-conference event at the Enchanted Springs Ranch, I learned for the first time about Mogulus. Seeing it for the first time BLEW my mind away. What a way to have PDOD (professional development on demand). I’d been toying with a way to create an anthology of PD webcasts/screencasts of myself in front of my laptop and using screen capturing software to demonstrate concepts. This website takes it to the next level. Actual demonstration, rather than screen captures. And it can run continuously if I so choose.

The second great PD idea I’m going to borrow is Kevin Honeycutt’s Web 2.0 Keychain he gives out to his teachers. What a novel idea and a way to have not only web 2.0 tools, but traditional websites at the fingertips. I’ve started to create my own and will definitely share when I’m finished.

I was able to attend a session on building a better School TV production show on Monday morning. Still trying to get my hands on a copy of their resource cd, but did use google docs to type up some GREAT ideas that I can take back for the start of the school year. This will be my first foray into tv production of this sort, so it should be a VERY nice challenge for me. Heck, it’s already paying dividends, I was able to get out of my morning duty to work with the students during this time. YAY!

I am already looking forward to next year’s experience in Washington DC. Looks like the wife might be coming too. That should be a fun time definitely.

Seeking the Wisdom of the Ages…

Tom.

When  looking at our goal in education, what is it that we are there to do? Let’s take a look at my school district’s mission statement: “To ensure rigorous, relevant learning experiences that result in high achievement for our students.” To what point is learning rigorous and relevant? By whose standards? The  FDOE, State DOE or local school boards? Relevant to what? Standards that are in place  to allow success on benchmark testing?

I hear all the time when walking into classrooms and breakrooms on campus that there is not time for the ‘fluffy’ stuff that I’m there to help teachers with. The stuff that the students need are all in the text books anyways. Who has time to create a wiki or blog? Where would I fit into my day the time to tape my students creating video books to share with other classes and grade levels? Heaven help us all if learning turned out to be fun in any way, shape or form!

What type of games are out there that would allow students to learn and *gulp* and have some fun? I’ve compiled a list of a few that might work.

1. Webkinz – I’m not going to rehash this as I wrote about this earlier this week. Still find that it would be an invaluable tool in the classroom.
2. Roller Coaster Tycoon (or any other Tycoon based game) – I love this series of games. I remember playing one of the first versions of RCT that came out years ago, and how addicting it was to try and get more and more people to show up to my theme park. Creating a roller coaster of your own can be interesting. Can’t get the cars to go back up the rise of tracks? Hrm….sounds like a physics issue there. Better get Newton’s Laws of Physics out for a lesson.
3. Sim Tower Sim City or Sim Theme Park – Old school versions of RCT and that genre. I’ve found Sim Tower online through ebay and have contemplated buying it again. Between these 2 games and RCT, what better life and math lesson is there than to have to create your own parks/cities. I remember in Sim Tower creating shopping malls on the top floor of the tower (about floor 100 I think) and it not doing well. Then tasked my daughter with creating a tower similar but choosing to put the shopping area in the basement and she was quickly making money to create more types of shops and condo units.
4. Sid Meier’s Gettysburg, Civilizations Series, etc – What a greatly cool thing to do to learn about historical events, then to recreate them via software. Don’t like the way General Robert E. Lee performed at Gettysburg? Just think of the possibilities that can be explored by allowing General John Bell Hood to perform a flanking maneuver on day 2 instead of the assaults on Little Round Top. Might have a different  result possibly.
5. World of Warcraft or other MMORPGs – I know what might be going through your heads. Tom, you are a WoW-head of course you are going to espouse using such a thing. One thing that I’ve noticed in my lifetime of gaming (going back to Advanced Dungeon and Dragons days using pen/paper) that there is a THRIVING economy in these games. Since leaving San Antonio I’ve been enjoying the family vacation up here in Niagara Falls, NY, yet I’m still able to log into World of Warcraft and complete some minor tasks that does NOT involve any killing. Yet, I’ve still been able to make about 300 in gold by performing these tasks (usually creating food that other players consume and selling off items that other people can use to cook) Sounds like a math lesson in there somewhere to me.
6. Fantasy Sports – I LOVE my fantasy football and baseball. Can’t go a football season without having at least 2 football leagues that I’m a part of. Dan Flockhart created a math curriculum to go with fantasy sports and mathematics. I saw this about a year and a half ago on ESPN and is definitely worth taking a look at if you are a math teacher.

Notice a trend there? Alot of math. In my most humble of opinions, alot of emphasis is placed on reading (rightly so) but sometimes I feel it’s to the detriment of mathematics. Right now the GLS conference going on in Madison, WI. (Gaming + Learning + Society) I’m hoping some literature or webcasts come from this conference to sink my teeth into. I know Kevin Jarrett and David Jakes are there. Here’s hoping they have something they can share with everyone.

Seeking the Wisdom of the Ages…

Tom.

Yesterday I looked at the first part of play, that being structured. Today I will tackle the second form of play, unstructured. There are several avenues that children can partake in unstructured play. The conventional method is through recess. That time where teachers usually take their children outside and allow their students to ‘have at it’ so to speak. I’ve heard from administrators that this is a liability nightmare. Typical though, shying away from a productive part of the day for fear of litigation.

So where is the outlet that our children need from the daily grind of learning?  Our students are bombarded by  a HUGE mountain of required learning for standardized testing, one fatal mistake is being made on a daily basis. Our students are not being allowed to be children. They are not being given a chance to learn to ‘play’ together on the playgrounds and playfields. Broken down, this means that students are not being given a chance to learn collaboration on their own. I remember growing up playing ‘war’ in my neighborhood with at least 2 dozen other boys and girls. We gave ourselves objectives for opposing teams to complete to be able to win (usually a capture the flag type deal). This would NEVER happen in today’s society because of the whole guns today looking alot like plastic/toy guns. But it was play like this that taught the power of leadership and working together as a team to accomplish a common goal. I will ask the same question that I asked in my previous post, does this have anything to do with learning what a noun is or how to divide by double digits from double digits? Probably not, but as most of us already know, there is more to education than the proverbial “X’s and O’s”.

What does this all have to do with Technology? Tons. I remember a few months back my daughter came home and said she was able to log onto her Webkinz account from school when she was finished with all her work. My wife was AGHAST. I was pretty ok with it actually. For those that don’t know, Webkinz is a virtual world. The only way to get in there is to buy a Webkinz pet of some sort. You get a code to create an account. You are responsible for feeding the pet, taking care of it, putting it to sleep and bathing/hygiene type things, or the pet will get sick. Haven’t asked my daughter to go so far as to allow that to happen yet, just to see what happens. As it stands now, I’m pretty positive I have well over 30 Webkinz pets strolling around my house (bleh! is all I can say about that!). Not only does my 3rd grade daughter have many pets that she tends to in this virtual world, so does my 6 year old son (just turned 6 less than a month ago, which is important to remember).

As with the real world, money in the Webkinz world is key. The economy is driven by “kinzcash”. You get so much for creating a new pet in the world. You can get kinzcash for selling off gems that you can search for in a cave. You can also earn kinzcash by playing different type of games, or doing jobs. The moral of this is, it is NOT very hard to earn money in this virtual world. It is important though to be able to purchase items for your rooms for your pets, as well as food and other luxury items that you may desire. Back to my son though. Being 6 now, but 5 for the time that this example is taking place, he really has zero formal education in economic issues and concerns. Being 6, his mother and father take care of all of his wants and needs. One thing is for certain though, my son is VERY understanding that when his kinzcash amount reaches 0, he needs to sell off some stuff that he knows he doesn’t need or use, or he simply plays a trivia game to earn money. The humor in that lies in the fact that he knows not a single answer to the trivia questions….he perfectly knows this and has said as much. He merely clicks on an answer and he still is able to earn money, whether the answer is right or wrong. Somewhere in there, there is an argument for getting something for nothing. Now’s not the time or place for that discussion. What I take the MOST out of that example is this: my five year old son was able to ‘learn’ on his own, a way/plan to get money in a virtual world to fulfill his wants/needs. Better yet. By looking at the curio shop (virtual store’s name), he knows how much the item(s) he wants costs. And he plays these games, sells off other items, to allow him to save enough money to get what he wants/needs (***Cough***Math Skills****Cough****)

By explaining this all to my wife, I brought her back to my daughter and her playing this Virtual Game at school. With the in game environment as safe as it is going to get (no chat allowed as of yet, only friends on her list are allowed to gain access to her house map, but unable to move anything) the academic pros well outweigh any cons that might be there. The fact of the matter is this, the face of unstructured play at school has changed, this is what that face looks like. I applaud my daughter for the hard work she does in this virtual world. She works very diligently at making sure all her pets are tended to and that her garden is weeded everyday, lest the weeds get out of control. I would show screen shots of the map of her ‘house’ but I’ve been unable to do so. I keep trying to get her to log onto her account on my macbook or to give me her account user info to which she won’t. I really cannot complain about her not giving me her account info (I know mom has it, but I’m not going to push that), it goes to show that she is listening to the ground rules that I’ve laid out for her to continue using it.

I will finish tonight with this one final thought:

I don’t know about you, but Mr. Fred Rogers is someone I trust and someone whom I feel can’t be stated unequivocally as an expert in this field.

Seeking the Wisdom of the Ages…

Tom.

I’m still reeling over my NECC experience. Not because of the sessions that were offered, not because of the enormous amount of people that converged upon San Antonio, but because of the many people, most of them like-minded about the edtech community, that I was able to converse with. But this is not a NECC reflection post. That will come later (I think/hope).

Since the ‘new’ thing to do is to have every unit have a unit essential question (admins and curriculum specialists are ALMOST there, now they just have to get on board with Project Based Learning), I will ask one: What affect does play have on learning?

I’ve spoken in the past about my gaming experiences. I’m sure many can say that my present run in gaming has led to my recent hiatus in blogging. Can’t deny that fact is partially true. I see in my gaming experiences many opportunities to learn, cooperate and collaborate with other individuals (adults and teens alike, as I have both in my online gaming guild).

So where has play gone in the school day? I know at my school, recess is a forbidden part of the day. Taboo to even think of asking for permission to go out for? It seems that the only play many of our students are getting these days is through the physical education programs. And even that is pretty non-existent. Let’s step back a step or two first.

As some of you may or may not know, my educational background is in physical education. Playing at it’s finest. Playing within a set of boundaries, rules or guidelines. I’ve never regretted taking what many people call as an ‘easy’ route to getting an education degree. Hogwash I say. Try supervising almost 60 to 70 students at a time, outside with no walls to contain them, all the while making sure they are kept active and engaged. Anyone that can do that can handle a classroom job with NO problems. These experiences have taught me that there are two types of playing. Simply put: structured and unstructured.

Structured play is what you see out on the fields and in the gymnasiums of schools. Being taught by physical educators with sound pedagogical knowledge. Learning DOES take place. It might not have anything to to with A,B,C’s or what a noun is, even though many PE teachers are now expected to incorporate concepts dealing with standardized testing into their curriculums, our students must work within those sets of boundaries given to them, work collaboratively with fellow classmates for a common goal: To Win. Yes, I said it…that DREADED “C” word. competition.

I’ve contemplated making this one SUPER long entry, i don’t think I can express myself that much in one sitting and give it justice. My time at the Strong Museum of Play today in Rochester left me reeling and with many thoughts. Food for thought though:

Don’t know about all of you…but I think Dr. Brown got it right on. Don’t believe me? Video tape any class out at recess, if they are allowed to go out for it still.

Seeking the Wisdom of the Ages…

Tom.

My negative NECC karma continues. Was a year ago now in Atlanta that I was unable to blog during my first NECC experience due to edublogs going through some growing pains. That negative karma continues this year with the airport card in my macbook going kapoot on me. Thanks to Teryl Magee for letting me use hers to at least get some thoughts typed up.

1. I’m still missing my friend Jen Wagner. Thankfully I was able to talk to her for a bit yesterday before David Jakes and Dean Shareski’s session yesterday morning. You too Diana, but you are off hammocking in the jungle somewhere.
2. ISTE’s done a better job  this year I think of keeping rooms from overflowing into the hallways. It has reminded me of going to Disney World and using the FAST Pass system for the rides. In the sessions I went to last night I averaged getting there almost 45 minutes early just to make sure I had a seat.
3. I made it through yesterday having successfully accomplished my daily goal of learning ‘one thing’. Thanks to David Jakes for making sure that happened. He showed Flickrstorm to help in finding Creative Commons images. 
4. Blogger’s Cafe. Wow….just like last year. Conversations, un-conference type learning and connecting with other like minded individuals. Finally getting to meet f2f many of the people that I follow in blogs and twitter is amazing.