Layer 1
There is clearly something rotten in the state of our assessments. Perhaps teachers are too far removed from the anxiety and pressure that a high-stakes test puts on a student, but it only takes one role reversal to fix that little problem. Recently, as a participant in a county wide technology conference, was asked to "be the student" for roughly an hour and a half while some exemplar teachers in our county put on a technological and pedagogical show. We were quiz, quiz, trading, we were collaborating with our shoulder and face partners, we were frantically filling out graphic organizers, all the while the hourglass (literally, there was a digital hourglass on the board) slowly seeped away. Don't misunderstand me, all effective strategies, and by all means I love time efficiency in the classroom, but when asked to identify certain "figurative language" in a given poem, I was so nervous I'd be wrong in front of my senior English colleagues, I almost forgot my own name (that would be correctly identified as "hyperbole"). Did these questions placed on me on the spot truly "test" my cumulative knowledge? Did they measure my worth as a thinker, learner, or most importantly a human being? I'm reminded of Bill Cerbin's point that traditional testing is like taking someone's temperature--it simply tells us their current temperature, it makes no evident claims on past medical conditions, their holistic symptoms, or predictive prescriptions, hence it it measures what we ask temporarily, but lacks the efficiency of long-term diagnoses. Our formative and summative assessment of students needs to be relational, transformative, and holistic.
The theorists this week have focused on portfolio assessments as the cure for the common assessment. Portfolio assessment is defined as "a purposeful, multidimensional process of collecting evidence that illustrates a student's accomplishments, efforts, and progress (utilizing a variety of authentic evidence) over time" (Gillespie, et. al., 487). Sublime definition. They go even further to recommend that the materials included in the portfolio, the criteria to evaluate them, and the types of reflections be a collaborative effort between students and teacher--truly empowering the student, giving them an autonomous voice in their own learning process. This particular section of Gillespie's article is where I would like to sink my teaching teeth into (isn't that where the best writing usually? By the end, the writer is thinking deep and has stopped trying to put so much fluff in...but I digress).
Their recommendation to allow students to have more valuable input into the material and the criteria for the portfolio is certainly something I can work on. I attempted a online portfolio website last year with one of my classes and it went as I should have expected: terribly. I blame myself, because essentially I neglected it. Here's an example of one of my students' work: click here. (https://sites.google.com/site/maggiecraddockscameo/). As you can see, I asked each student to create their own website, as an ongoing review and a place to digitally post their work, including Google PowerPoint Presentations, embed Google Documents, and to blog about short writing prompts that I gave them. I simply neglected to continue the work on the site, because it took conscious effort to have students post, as well as the usual problems with internet availability and laptops. With the recommendations I now have in mind, I will make a conscious effort to set aside time to work on the sites, make the work on the site the original location of the work (instead of a secondary resource to review/post after completion), and I will allow students more say in what is included and collaboratively designed rubrics to evaluate their work.
As a side note, I did not find Bond's article particularly helpful. Their ideas on having students write "I Learned" statements or filling out a "Clear/Unclear" two column notes, while good-intentioned, seemed a bit contrived to me. I think we could achieve much the same intent by having students discuss with their shoulder partners what they learned and then after that discussion (which would feature a time for their partner to attempt an answer!) students would be asked to write down at least one question they still had--written because of the embarrassed nature of ignorance--the teacher could look over these questions for rethinking their review tomorrow or to utilize in an Q&A session the next day.
Layer 2
I was thoroughly impressed with the Podcast and the work Bill Ferriter is doing in his integrated Social Studies/Language Arts class. Students were clearly demonstrating their effective navigation of new literacies from creating their own podcasts, critically analyzing breaking news in video and digital formats, script writing, and HTML source coding. Did I mention these are middle schoolers? Henry Jenkins, in his podcast on Participatory Learning, had some powerful things to say about how schools can sometimes be detrimental to a child's growth by actually "de-tooling" and "de-skilling" the students by limiting their access to rich resources such as YouTube. (My school system does not allow YouTube, but our principal has luckily given us permission to by-pass those restrictions, because she trusts our abilities to use content-rich resources and we take full educational responsibility and opportunity with this). Some new literacies that forward thinking teachers must consider are our shift towards digital communication. Whether that be through text, twitter, email, podcast, blogs, wikis, or skype, the way we communicate the written and spoken language are changing. Many traditionalists bemoan this, but the ancient Greeks bemoaned the arrival of written language, crying that people would soon lose their ability to think and remember without the aid of the written word.
My only concern with emerging technologies, and perhaps I did not understand the lesson completely, is our seeming blanket acceptance of their usefulness in the classroom without asking if we truly need to include them. Before you label me a philistine or a luddite, hear me out: for the sake of critically evaluating the current event, why were students asked to create a podcast, transcribe the audio into a written format, and post on the blogosphere, to await comments? Could this not be achieved more efficiently by simply having students prepare remarks to be given to a fellow student as the beginning of a conversation they would then have? I fear we're preparing our students to be shallow ranters, hiding behind the anonymity of pseudonyms and faceless blogs. I don't pretend to know where are new literacies are taking us, but I am open to change and I willing to at least try out all new forms of literacy. There are certainly strengths and weaknesses in all cases--with blogs for example, I found that students were more than eager to share their thoughts and opinions (when journaling was like pulling teeth), but I did find the thoroughness of their thinking and the soundness of their grammar to be a bit weaker. Emerging technologies and the ubiquitous use of new literacies is however the way things will always be for the rest of my lifetime and I must do my best to prepare students to meet those challenges with preparation, resourcefulness, and thoughtfulness.
I felt the same way about the way the emergence of new literacies seems to invalidate everything that came before. The Connectivism article said something about how "learning is no longer an internal, individualistic activity" (Siemens, 2004). I would argue that learning was never an individualistic activity, that it has always been collaborative and communal. As a parent myself, I had reservations about the podcast when the students mentioned how most people assumed they were adults and therefore lent more credence to what they said. I'm pretty sure I don't want people assuming my 10 year old daughter is an adult online. Aside from those reservations however, I can see the appeal for students and it was clear how engaged they were(at least some of them). I guess it is up to us to achieve the balance in our own environments and make sure the technology is being used responsibly. Thanks for the post!
ReplyDeleteI had a similar reaction to new literacies when I first began to consider them this summer. I am a part of the first generation to really grow up with all of this surrounding technology, but I admit that it frightened me to think about how much it is taking over and how quickly. But I've actually changed my mind, and pretty radically at that. Some of the articles on connectivism make an important point that the presence of technology changes the way we think and learn, and I have come to realize that there can be a lot more profound learning to be done when students are allowed to make use of these resources that have become such a part of their everyday lives. This is not to say that any random inclusion of technology is going to be beneficial. In fact, surveys of technology use in the classroom have shown that students lose interest when teachers don't seem to understand how to incorporate technology correctly and effectively. But if these resources can be used well, they can serve students in great capacities. I for one have found that more than hiding, I am encouraged to speak out and make my presence known in blogs and twitter, etc because the nature of the medium is less intimidating to me than the traditional classroom. On that note, I will conclude with the suggestion that one of the benefits of using blogs, for example, is that they fit into the social networked world that students are a part of. When kids develop online personalities that seek to "friend" and "follow," commenting and receiving comments on a blog might be a validation of sorts which makes it more appealing and engaging to a student.
ReplyDeleteWanted to clarify the Ferriter podcasting, Andrew. I didn't make it clear enough in the editing that the kids wrote their scripts, recorded them, and then posted their podcast to their blog with a brief intro. So they weren't circling back to transcribe their podcasts.
ReplyDeleteBut your point is well made that technology has been often been misused for the illusion of progress. Judi Harris's rules are to only use technology when it enables you to do something you could do before but now better and to do something you couldn't do before.
I checked out Maggie's blog and I was surprised that there wasn't more depth. I mean she had said she really liked Beowulf. Why do you think that your students' writing is better when they journal than blog? Do they feel freer to explore their academic selves when you're their only reader? Is it not cool to be intellectual? Or are blogs and tech in general still considered novel for school and not really taken seriously? Lots of possibilities . . .