Author Archives: jkuhns

Industrial Age vs. Information Age

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A shift in the world has obviously taken place over the last hundred years and it has accelerated into a boom in the last ten to fifteen years. As I am sure things changed slowly in the shift from educational ideals prior to the industrial revolution to industrial age norms, education establishments are slowly treading into the information age. The change has come so quickly that teachers with fifteen or more years of experience are more than slightly overwhelmed. Those that did not embrace technology at the offset are now struggling with simple tasks as we strive to take the next step. Administrations cannot continue to devote time for instructing staff on how to access email and use spreadsheets when the new expectation is to Skype and use backchannels.

In the Industrial Age there was a strong need for students to conform. When the bulk of the employment opportunities were for factory workers, schools needed to churn out students who could perform mundane tasks for long periods of time. A hundred years ago a sincere issue among political leaders was how to find enough factory workers. For that reason, government leaders and heads of industry viewed school as a way to produce the human resources that they needed to continue to be productive. They couldn’t afford to allow schools to produce thinkers because thinkers weren’t very good workers. Those schools generally produced students who were good at going to school. A top student would be one who used good manners, never received punishment for the teacher, and always did their homework. Children who were good at going to school would also be good at going to work.

In the Information Age we practically need the antithesis of Industrial Age schooling. We need to begin churning out students who can solve problems that we don’t even know are problems yet and students who can lead. The jobs of the future will require students to have creative minds. These adults will be required to collaborate with others and question whatever is placed before them. Employers will be looking for workers who can use their networks to find the answer to whatever conundrum they come upon. Networked people will be more powerful than the greatest scholar because they will have the brain power of hundreds or thousands of minds. Today we can’t afford to produce students who are just good at school. We need to produce students who can survive without a detailed syllabus. Being like everyone else will no longer be a sought after attribute.

#hashtags and #edchats; a primer

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So, a couple of people have asked me to elaborate on what constitutes a Twitterchat. Especially as it refers to educational Twitterchats. I guess to put it simply, it’s a chat that occurs on Twitter! Too simple?

Okay then, a little history. In the Dark Ages of Twitter, the search feature was disastrous. It was almost impossible to find people with whom you wanted to chat. For that reason, someone came up with the idea of using hashtags (#). Now, if you wanted to search for a group or a particular subject you could just search the hashtag. If people remembered to use the hashtag, it was easy to find the conversation. Thankfully those days are over and the hashtags are not necessary. They do however persist and have taken on a new role. Hashtags now allow you to search and find a conversation even if you weren’t present for it. They also allow you to follow a conversation in semi-real time as well as participate in said discussion. It’s kind of like having a conversation with a large group of people on a common subject. Doesn’t matter if you know them or if you “friend” or follow them. Everyone is there to talk about a commonality.

Which leads us to #edchats or #educhats. The education community has run away with the idea of joining people of like minds to have conversations using hashtags. There are so many hashtags that  it would be insane for me to try to list them all. Luckily a Twitterer extraordinaire has done that for us. Jerry Blumengarten, who can be found @cybraryman1 on Twitter, has compiled a monster list of educational hashtags. (Don’t go look for it now! I’ve included a link to a livebinder site with all the info). I didn’t count them but there are way over 100. Everything from New teachers #ntchat to Australia education chat #ozchat. He has also but together a nice schedule, although not comprehensive, of when the chats are live – I’ve included that in the live binder.

So, here’s what you do. Most people who chat suggest that you use a third-party app. It is not completely necessary especially if you are using mobile devices but it does make it a little easier. I use TweetCaster on my Iphone and Ipad and TweetDeck on my desktop. There are others too like Hoot Suite and Seesmic. If you are going to participate live, put the hashtag in the search bar on your app. It will immediately take you to all the tweets with the same hashtag. For example, one that I like to participate in is #geniushour. I put #geniushour into the search and magically all the tweets are there. One thing that you will want to do if you find a chat that you like is to follow the moderator. This will allow you to know what the topic for the discussion will be prior to the chat. The moderator will be the person asking the questions. They will number their questions Q1, Q2, Q3, etc. You can just follow along or you can participate. If you participate, you should label your answers A1, A2, A3, etc. so that everyone can follow the conversation. Within a question there is always some back and forth between participants and a lot of retweeting.

If you happen to not make it to the live chat, no worries. You can search the hashtag anytime after the chat and see the whole conversation. Many moderators also archive the chat in programs such as Storify or on their wikis for access after the fact.

Some of my favorites are #geniushour, #abedchat, and #DENchat. Those are probably good ones to start with. When you start to build you PLN, you will see people tagging their tweets with different hashtags. Feel free to search that tag and participate in the chat. I have tweeted with Alabamians in #aledchat and Chicagoans in #iledchat as well as the great Canadians in #abedchat.

As you can see, as your PLN grows, the world gets smaller and smaller. I regularly tweet with a teacher in Australia. One of the teachers in my building met a woman in Texas whom she regularly tweets with and Skypes into the classroom for class to class discussions. One day I had George Couros respond to my tweet. I was pretty ecstatic.

I know this is quick and dirty so I’ve created a livebinder with a bunch more information on educational chatting on Twitter. Much credit should go to @cybraryman, Alan November(@globallearner), @EdTech_K-12. @CorMur21, and @teachthought.

If you have questions, ask below or find me @dogilicious on Twitter.

Hope to #edchat with you soon!

PLNing!

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Damn, now I’ve done it. I let the proverbial cat out of the bag! In my Teach and Facilities Management course we read about establishing a PLN. One of the challenges issued by the good Doctor was to start a blog to reflect on what it is that we do. For those of you who have read this blog in the past, you know that’s not always what I do. My narcissism was hanging out though! What could I do? The good Doctor was praising everyone who started a blog and I just blurted it out! “I’ve got a blog at http://www.40phor.com but it’s not new.” See what I;m saying. Now all of these people are going to stop by and read it! I’ve tried for so long to keep this quiet (and if you could see mt stats you would know what I’m saying!) and in the minds of complete strangers. Now I have to really work at it.

So let the PLN begin! I have been working hard to create a working list of followers and the followed on Twitter. I must confess, though, that a big pile of those educators are the ones who feel the same way that I do about the deleterious reformers and their little bubble sheets. My community of people that I learn from is smaller but powerful. I like to hit the #edchats whenever possible especially #geniushour and #abed (who knew there was so much progressive ed. in Canada) and the occasional #satchat.

Welcome to my little PLN and since I have resolved to write daily for the near future, I’ll try to ebb the flow of the politics of education to spend more time on educational reflection.

If you haven’t read my about page Ill give you a head’s up, this hasn’t always been a blog about education. It started out as me trying to find my way. It has settled fairly firmly on educational topics in the last year with a few minor digressions. Feel free to browse and if you are offended, saddened, disgusted, turned on, elated, I am glad that I instilled some type of emotion.

Do Principals Have to Work in the Summer?

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As an administrator, I’m always getting the age old question, “What do you do all summer?” It tends to irritate me that people feel I have to justify my summer work but I usually do it any way. I guess in some way I feel I need to. If you are an administrator you know what I mean. You also know that it is long days without much interaction especially in July when anyone else working tends to take vacation. Unfortunately summer tends to be my least favorite part of the year generally because of the lack of collegiality.

This summer I am trying to be a more productive leader. For me in the past summer as been like this: June – catch up on everything that you let go at the busy end of the year and begin looking at test scores, July – take some vacation time, August – begin preparations for the new year. Not always that cut and dry but those are the basics. My wife, the teacher, calculates it like this: June = Friday, July = Saturday, August = Sunday. If you’re a teacher that will make sense.

This summer I tried offering some professional development but it was poorly received. Basically many reasons for that chiefly that I couldn’t require attendance and I had nothing to offer in exchange – no Act 48, no money, no exchange. I also have set aside an hour at the beginning of every day to explore my PLN, catch up on professional reading, and generally try to become a better leader.

My question to all of the educators out there: How do you spend your summer? Please don’t tell me “at the beach” because I might just cry!

Do It For Them

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One of the things that I know I contemplate often is the fact that we don’t take enough time out to reflect on what an important position we hold in this country. As teachers and people who lead schools we have a very important responsibility. I know that may sound trite but if you seriously reflect on the role that we have in the lives of students, it is more than a tad overwhelming. The time that students spend with us is equal to or often times more than they spend with any other adult figure.

If you have had the opportunity to work with students who are from low income or otherwise difficult households, you will see this impact multiplied. These students are looking for attention, someone to look up to, and sometimes love. At the end of the school year these are the students who don’t want to go home. They don’y know why but they want to stay at school. They want to stay because they feel safe, they fell loved and they feel that they belong. The experience at home may not be the same. This impact that we have on students is profound. Some of us have even had the pleasure of a student who mistakenly called us mom or dad or uncle or aunt. And sorry to say, grandma or pop. That happens because we fill that void for them when their near relatives are absent or maybe we fill that need in general.

In that vein, don’t we have a responsibility to step up our game on a daily basis? I have told my staff on several occasions that my expectation is that they are all in everyday. Can a reasonable leader expect anything less? I’m not sure what we would be holding back for. This is the only shot we have. It is the only shot that your students have. We owe it to ourselves, our students and the world to go all out, to be all in, on a daily basis. There really is no time to be off your game because today might be the day you changed someone’s life deeply and do you really want to be the one to steal someone’s dream. I don’t and I don’t want to be responsible for the person who does.

In this day there is very little love for education in the mainstream. Respect for teachers and education is in the doldrums. But we chose this. And in a way, this chose us. I’s okay for us to be mad at the worked for the way we have been treated but it’s not alright to make students the victims. Some days I know it is hard to do it for ourselves but remember why we are really here: Do it for them!

Smart ALEC?

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If you are a supporter of public education and you haven’t heard of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). You should do a little reading. ALEC is powerful and it has in it’s sights public education in the United States.

ALEC is a 501(c)(3) non profit. It’s purpose is to advance the conservative agenda by crafting “model” bills with legislators and corporate biggies. Like all things that are legitimate in this country, ALEC’s model bills are secret. Reason I guess to believe that they have nothing to hide.

As my ranting has been going over the last few days you can probably imagine that they have their fingers in education somewhere. In fact, they do.

In 2011, ALEC designed a model bill on virtual charter schools. This bill was leaked to The Nation and appears on the website “ALEC Exposed.” The bill of course is very long but interestingly they include a “simple version” apparently for those of us who attended real public schools. The simple version reads like this:  

“Nothing in this bill shall preclude the use of computer- and
Internet-based instruction for students in a virtual or remote setting.”

That sounds pretty harmless. In one short sentence, ALEC advocates for virtual or cyber charter schools. Not a big deal, they have several advocates. 

But wait, maybe it is a big deal. According to PolicyMic.com, our good friends at Pearson co chair the Education Task Force of ALEC. Pearson of course is the operator of Connections Academy, one of the largest networks of virtual charter schools in the country. Isn’t that like drafting a bill requiring every school to hire a juggling clown and your new son-in-law just graduated from clown college. Talk about buttering your own bread. 

Oh, that’s not enough to get your panties in a bunch. How about this? According to SourceWatch, Lisa Gillis of K12, Inc. is the Private Sector Chair ALEC’s Education Task Force’s Special Needs Subcommittee. K12, Inc.is another for profit education company with cyber or virtual charters in every state that claims they are the same as “brick and mortar” charters. This would include two of the largest cybers in Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Virtual Charter School and Agora Cyber Charter.

So why should you care? ALEC is a very powerful organization. They create model bills that benefit the corporations that align with ALEC and then throw money behind their legislators when they support the Models when they become realities. If you think that it is alright to sell out our students to the highest bidder then this article wasn’t written for you. If, on the other hand, you believe that a public school is not one that is listed on the NYSE (K12,Inc. and Connections Academy) you should read and be wary.

The issue goes deeper than using state subsidy to fund cybercharters too. When a student in Pennsylvania enrolls in a cybercharter, more than the state subsidy attached to that student is billed to the district. There is even a larger gap when the student has an individualized education plan. That means that some of the money going to our cyber friends is local money. Also, in Pennsylvania, the three largest cyber schools received almost $4 million in Title I funds. For those of you who don’t know, that’s federal money. I’m not sure how PDE allocates so much to a system that encompasses no real district, but I’m working on it.

If your legislators are affiliated with ALEC, I urge you to contact them and let them know that you support public education. If you want to know where your legislators stand, here’s a handy guide: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Pennsylvania_ALEC_Politicians. There is also a list of corporations: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=ALEC_Corporations and non-profits: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/ALEC_Non-Profits

Rich School , Poor School

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Is there any question that every child has the right to the same education? I would say that education is a human right. When we talk about human rights we talk in terms of every child having equal access to a quality education. People from all sides of the argument can rally around that last statement. One side of the debate can argue that charter schools are the answer. When families have choices and competition exists, public schools will rise to the occasion. Another side will say that teacher quality is at an all time low and that is especially  relevant in low achieving schools. Obviously there are more than three sides but another legion will claim that a consistent, rigorous set of standards such as CCSS will equalize the education that every student receives.

Just so we’re clear, the people above fall into two categories: either they have have no concept of what education is like for some of our poorer citizens or they are outright liars with some kind of profiteering agenda.

According to Do Something, students who live below the poverty line have higher absentee rates, higher dropout rates and lower rates of post secondary education. In a post I wrote several months ago I compared PSSA scores to school district aid ratios. That research showed that the richer the school district is, the better chance that students will reach proficiency. That doesn’t really sound equal.

I can’t speak of all states but in Pennsylvania the funding inequities are tremendous. I know that I’ll hear that poor schools receive way more state funds than rich schools.No kidding. Spend more than a millisecond trying to figure out why that is. Poor schools, especially poor rural schools, have a very limited tax base. A limited tax base means poor local funding and I can assure you that the state does not make up that difference. That of course leads to districts surviving on a shoestring. Cutting positions that lead to larger class sizes. Cutting positions that make a difference to student achievement: literacy coaches, math coaches, reading specialists, counselors and paraprofessionals. According to a study by the Pennsylvania Education Law Center, the highest poverty school districts spend $75,000 less per classroom than the wealthiest schools. As in many other areas of our country, the privileged rich continue to flourish as the poor continue to languish.

As a human right, education should be of the same quality no matter your demographics. Students should have access to the same resources no matter their economic status. Education should aim to raise the achievement of every child not just the rich, powerful and politically connected.

What we have in Pennsylvania and across the nation is not an achievement gap, what we have is a funding gap. Rather than billionaires spending there money on influencing education policy, what if they used some of that money to equalize the funding in our impoverished urban and rural school districts.

Pearson for Profit

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For my summer classes I had to buy several books that left a sting on the old pocketbook. One book, though, really rubbed me the wrong way. The book, Curriculum Development: A Guide to Practice, cost me $134.11! That’s pretty salty for a book that doesn’t even have nice pictures. For that price I would expect the book to read itself. Anyway, what really burned me was when I received the book and found out it was published by Pearson.

If you know anything about Pearson, you know that they have their fingers tightly entwined in the education market. Pearson’s influence in education is widespread from K-12 education through college. Pearson owns Connections Academy, a virtual charter school conglomerate with schools in 24 states. They have a cooperative agreement with the University of Phoenix, the largest for profit post secondary school in the country. They are also “partners” with the CCSSO, one of the so-called creators of the CCSS. The CCSSO works closely with none other than Jeb Bush. The list goes on and on but I need to include that they are also involved in providing assessments for PARCC, GED and SAT. Wow, that’s a lot of influence for one publishing company. How did that come to be?

Well, that is rather simple. Pearson has influenced federal and state government over the last three years to the tune of about $5.5 million. Interesting that greasing the palms of politicians will get you a seat at the front table when contracts are handed out. Interesting that as a new need develops in the realm of education Pearson is there quickly with a solution. Not ready to devise a solution but with a ready made solution.

So, what’s the problem? The problem is this. Education is being construed as a means to make a profit. So called reformers develop reforms and then someone makes a fortune filling the gap created by the reform. The reformers and the hole fillers aren’t even educators. For the most part, they are anti public education. Jeb Bush? Bill Gates? Michelle Rhee? The Walton Foundation? All known associates of Pearson have suggested that public education is failing. But, public education needs Pearson because they conveniently have all the tools required by state and federal guidelines.

Am I going to go broke because I had to buy a $134.11 book? But for a company who sides with the people who believe in free market education, it seems strange that they have cornered the market in so many areas of public education.

Start With One Space

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I’m not usually a New Year’s resolution type of guy. I do use that time of the year as well as my birthday to reflect on what I have done and where I want to go. It helps to keep me focused and to stay in the moment.

This year I made an exception. I made a resolution. Don’t get too excited. It seems pretty simple. This year I resolved to only put one space after an end mark when I type. Tough one write. I read something about why we were taught in school to put two spaces and the logic seemed acceptable to me. With the advent of true type fonts, all letters no longer take up the same amount of space. On a typewrite each strike took up a finite amount of space. The double space was necessary to give the end of a sentence some room.

Anyway, not as easy as it sounds. For four or five weeks I backspaced and fixed every double space at the end of a sentence. Eventually I was doing it less and less until finally I don’t do it at all. 

So, what’s my point.

Habits. I know this is a simple example but it is an example of what it takes to get into the habit of doing something. I’m not talking about quitting smoking or any big deal habits but little, positive habits. For example, writing your blog, being creative, exercising, bettering yourself in some way.

I began reading this book called Manage Your Day-to Day: Build Your Routine, Find Your Focus, and Sharpen Your Creative Mind. It’s a collection of essays by people with creative minds and it gives their perspectives on the tenets of the book. 

In the second essay, Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project writes about the power of frequency. In her essay she talks about how frequency has helped advance her writing career. I won’t give you all the information; you should read it. She does though quote another great writer, Anthony Trollope, “A small daily task, if it really be daily, will beat the labours of a spasmodic Hercules.” 

When I think of leaders and educators in relation to this point, I think of the fact that we become overwhelmed by the big picture, the big ideas and sometimes that freezes us. “We’ll never get kids to think like the CCSS want us to” or “There is no way we will ever get students to be 100% proficient in PSSA.” I know I experience the same thing when I write. “I’ll never be able to write that well” or “I really don’t have anything good to write about today.” So we do nothing.

Doing nothing is easy. Making excuses is easy. Neither one will improve the learning of our students or get us where we want to be. Goals are a great idea but setting goals is only the first step in achieving them. Achieving goals means we have to bite off little bits at a time.

The point is that if we are focused and chip away at it every day, we can. If we make focus a priority and a habit and we do it with frequency, we can. If we take that gargantuan task and make them into minuscule, manageable tasks, we can. Every step forward is a step forward.

If we start with just one space.

Maybe We Should Teach

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If I were to contemplate, like so many other bloggers seem to do today, the failings of today’s education system, all of my thoughts could redirect to on word – small-mindedness (I hyphenated it so it might be two words but not the point).

Friends, Teachers, Pundits! Lend me your ears! I come to bury education not to fix it!

I don’t mean that literally. I mean it is time for sweeping change. For goodness sake we need to move on or be left behind. And when I say “we” I mean the education establishment. It’s time to quit looking over our shoulders and trying to stay one step ahead of Big Brother. Or more precisely Big, Rich Brother. We are the people who know children. We are the one’s who can change the system. And we will change the system for one reason: It’s what’s best for kids. 

I remember my parents telling me when I was in college that “sometimes you have to play the game.” Agreed. Sometimes. But not when the game hurts students, when the game keeps us mired in the past, when the game is designed to favor the rich, when the game puts more money in the pockets of millionaires and billionaires, when the game widens the opportunity gap, its time to take our ball and go home (figuratively!).

It is time for us to open up our minds. It is time for us to realize our power. It is time for us to look into the future and see what our students will see. Then we must ready ourselves to prepare them for it. It will not be easy; it will be disruptive. There probably won’t be a canned formula for any student’s success. We will have to be creative. We will have to allow our students to be creative. We will be nurturers and facilitators and cautious bystanders. Dr. Watson to our students’ Sherlock and Mr. Watson to our student Alexander Graham Bell. Charlie to President Bartlett?

Its not for the weak of heart or the small of mind. But do you want to look back and see that you didn’t prepare students for their futures because of someone’s political aspirations? Someone’s padded back account? Because of fear of falling behind internationally? Because of Big, Rich Brother? I think not!

Google “21st Century Skills.” Go ahead, I’ll wait. What did you find? Did it say anything about how standardized testing will prepare children for the future? Where there any sites that said that improving standards would improve student success in the future? Anywhere did it say that the best thing we could do for students is narrow the curriculum even more? 

I didn’t think so.

What it says is we need to teach students to think. We need to teach them to create. We need them to be able to draw a map not follow a map and we need them to tap into their own unique genius. Students will have to navigate devices that haven;t even been invented yet. They will have to collaborate – try to test that! Communication – aside on communication great TED talk on texting as new language – in languages that we aren’t teaching. Communicating in ways that we never thought of (John McWhorter talk above).

My biggest fear in education is that while we fight about what is best for kids, the 21st century is coming and we can’t stop it as hard as we might try. My biggest fear is that while we wait to be told what to do our students are falling further behind. It’s time to stand up, grow a backbone and do what we know is right.