Blog

I've decided I am going to experiment on blogs at school this year.

It seems to me that a blog, as a personal (I like this "personal" more than "individual") mean of expression, is fit for working outside ordinary contents, delving and internalizing knowledge.

Technically, I visited the Scuola-ER portal managed by my regional school authority, and probably with one of my classes I shall try using it. Anyway I find blogger easier and more suitable for its user management options.

For now I have launched the thing with one out of my three classes. I was too curious and I couldn't wait to be back from my paternal leave next month. With the other two classes I will probably wait until I am back, also seeing what happens with the active one.

In any case, the blog is hidden, accessible only to me and the students of the class. I wrote the parents (as I had done last year for the wiki) to explain my intentions and reasons. Tomorrow we'll start working on it.

Being first of all a personal work, I am quite curious to see how much the students will let themselves be "caught". I will keep you updated.        

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Wind blowing

School educational board, programming for the now starting year.

Asked by the Principal to speak about the school web site, I end my improvised talk saying: "ah, and well, should anyone be interested in experimenting anything in the field of web applications in education, I've read and done some little things and I am available to share and work together...".

The Principal: "Well then it would be really good if we could organize an internal personnel-update course for those teachers who are interested in these topics!".

How can you not like a school like this?

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Wikis with fifteen-sixteen-agers

Just to get back in activity with the blog, I'm updating the last post.

Wikis with fifteen-sixteen-agers. We finished them and the wikis are (almost) ready and eventually I was able to sort the final questionnaires and put them together.

Four classes, four wikis, one about electrization, one about lightnings and two about equilibrium in fluids.

The work was arranged as follows:

1. researching infos to answer some questions raised by observing some phenomena
2. information accumulation, skimming, group rewriting processes, ending in a single document for every student/group containing all information deemed pertaining, necessary and sufficient to describe the subject
3. choosing key-words and mind-mapping
   
4. assigning key-words to students and writing of individual encyclopedic entries about key-word
5. wiki population with
   
1. texts
2. images and graphic elements
3. links according to the mind-map and more
   
6. reading and mutual peer editing of the encyclopedic entries
7. self-assessment about the quality of own work, teacher's assessment about the quality of work, classwork on contents with a questionnaire about appreciation

From a scientific point of view, this should only be the beginning of a methodologic process that should lead to experimental verification in lab of the explanations found to the phenomena.

For me, it is anyway a starting point. The interesting thing that I want to share are the results of the appreciation questionnaire. The question was:

Question 3: With the wiki activity we worked in quite an unusual way: try to balance the books about this methodology, expressing in particular your opinion about:
a) is it or is it not useful to learn more (and, in case, which kind of thigs can you learn better and which can you learn worse?)
b) is it or is it not useful to motivate you to study
c) which aspects of this work do you find more positive and which more critical
d) suggestions, various thoughts, your ideas about what we have done.

The results are interesting. 37 students took part. The answers were free and of various length, some following the scheme, other more original. Here is a summary of the answers.

Pros

• you can learn ICT (32)
• you can learn physics (22)
• it makes studying physics light (21)
• you get motivation from the fact that you are creating something (20)
• you learn to use the net in order to study and learn (14)
• you get to cooperate with your school mates, even when they live far away (14)
• it's different (13)
• you can go in depth with unknown words and concepts (10)
• you learn a method of work that will be useful in future (8)
• you share ideas (8)
• you are forced to pay attention to the connections between concepts (8)
• you reach plenty of specific and detailed information (7)
• you get motivated by using computers and the net (6)
• you can study in a creative and constructive way (5)
• you learn to cooperate (5)
• it facilitates theoretical learning (5)
• working so much on shared information you get to understand its contents (4)
• the product grows with everybody's contribution (4)
• it's accessible everywhere and always (3)
• you get to interact directly and at any time with the teacher (2)
• it makes your school innovative (2)
• you become curious about the final result (2)
• you are responsible of what you write (2)
• you produce your own studying materials (2)
• you can work alone or in a group (2)
• you improve the net (2)
• you learn how to evaluate and improve your and other mates' work (2)
• you share working methods (1)
• it motivates students who like working in groups and share (1)
• you get to use the school's ICT labs (1)
• you don't write with a pen but on a keyboard (1)
• you learn to express yourself in an appropriate way (1)
• it's easier than learning on books (1)
• it forces you to read everybody's work (1)

Cons

• it's difficult if you don't have a computer or an internet connection at home, or if the schools computers are slow or malfunctioning (16)
• technically editing isn't too easy (5)
• sometimes the information you find is not correct or appropriate or adequate or reliable (4)
• some can work more and others less, coordinating is not always easy (2)
• working in the PC room is distracting (2)
• sometimes you end working alone anyway (1)
• little practical learning (1)
• there's a risk that someone's contributions are mishandled by others (1)
• you go in too little depth regarding physics (1)
• someone can be unable to study on a PC (1)
• the topic wasn't interesting (1)
• you learn well your own contribution but not the others' (1)
• not enough time to absorb the contents (1)

Suggestions

• work like this more frequently (30)
• use this method in other subjects or topics (4)
• make the wikis accessible to everyone, not only to our classes (3)
• keep changing groups (2)
• build a social network (1)
• build a gaming site (1)
• improve graphics (1)
• the school should provide tools for everyone to have an experience like this (1)
• choose better topics (1)
• insert exercises (1)
• insert summaries (1)
• insert lesson notes (1)
• use IM services (1)

Feels like it's a good first time. Although I have some corrections and steerings to think of for the next time. In a next post I'll focus on these.

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Who's afraid of ICT?

One of the big electoral slogans, here in Italy a few years ago, was about the "three I's" ("inglese, informatica, impresa", English, ICT, enterprise) to be injected in our schools, something many teachers (including myself) considered either ludicrous or scary, according to the moment.

Probably we are there again. So we'd better deal with it.

One of the three "I's" was ICT. Why should we find it ludicrous or scary?

Let me state my starting point, so that I am not misunderstood: I consider the main part of my teaching profession to be helping students to develop some behaviours that are transversal to the subjects I teach, but which, thanks to these subjects, can be learned by the students. Here I am talking about things like: critical attitude, curiosity for culture, autonomous learning, introjecting universal values, consistency with said values, ability to listen, cooperate, interact hierarchically... Such little things. And I used the adjective "main" to mean that I belong to a school of thought for which if a student develops these behaviours but is not capable of integrating a rational function, I am very happy all the same. Maybe I can't grade him very high, but nonetheless he will be quite aware of my esteem for him.

Well, starting with this, why doesn't the "I" of ICT scare me? As a matter of fact, I am not convinced of the absolute usefulness of ICT in learning maths and physics: I am a bit of a traditional guy here. But I am convinced that I can use ICT to build critical attitude, curiosity for culture, and so on and so on.

Paradoxically, sponsoring a frontal attack of ICT in schools can mean that a technicist education prevails, based on notions and work-oriented more than person-oriented, but it can also mean its exact contrary. Easily. As usually, reforms travel on the legs of those who work in the field, and tools are ambivalent. If students will have less "cultural" subjects classes, if they meet the right teachers, they will also have more classes where culture pass through more modern media. And, who knows, perhaps students will be more attracted to it.

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Wiki, didactics and assessment

As I wrote in a previous post, I decided to experiment using didactically a wiki with my four 14-16ers classes.

This experience, that's proceeding with some labour but, for now, in a satisfactory way, is teaching me a lot. First of all it teaches me that a wiki is just a tool. Finding colleagues who are so fond of technology in education that they miss its goal, is easy today. So, a wiki is a tool serving didactics, let me write it down clearly so I won't forget even if right now I adore wikis.

This, to me, means that, more than its practical usage (that has still some educational values in a school environment), its worth is the side-work. Preparing texts and materials, building the conceptual network, organizing the work, timeliness, accuracy: these are, in my opinion, aspects that must get through in a wiki-related project, perhaps even as assessment indicators for the completed project.

If our idea is to help our students to learn how to learn (repetition is on purpose), we would do well if we provide them with methods, in order to lead them without doing the work for them. For this I think that a good organization of a wiki-related project is necessary: so students can take advantage of the wiki both in learning the subject-theme the wiki is about, and also, and especially, in reflecting on the methods and tools of technologically assisted collaborative learning.

Publishing a wiki is not the end of the project. The "dry-run" publication phase must lead to improvement of the finished product, before its possible "www" publication. So all students must explore the conceptual network represented in the wiki, be able to intervene improving and augmenting the contents already present or suggesting options to their authors for more radical changes, which, in turn, the authors must be able to accept or refuse giving reasons.

Commenting on a post of hers, I asked Talia to suggest how one can assess e-learning in the classroom. I don't want to be lazy, so I'll try to give my contribution, in spite of my confused feelings and not being an expert in the field. I think I can safely say that a wiki per se is un-assessable, in the sense that it is a collective product and it's impossible to partially assess individual contributions. What can we assess, though?

1. in the initial phase (pre-wiki): participation, quality and quantity of information found, timeliness, respecting tasks...
2. in the publication phase: care of contents and of links
3. in the final phase (post-wiki): the level of interaction and understanding shown in discussions about possible variants and corrections, the depth of the methodology and meta-subject reflection about the work done
4. in the summative phase (extra-wiki): specific learning of the subject-theme as shown in a suitable classwork.
   

Of these four phases, the first two seem open to self-assessment by students, or peer-assessment, while the last two are more traditional and require expert and competent eyes of the teacher. The way to organize self-assessment or peer-assessment can depend, in my opinion, on the age and maturity of the students. It can be an anonymous matrix where each student marks his/her own and his/her mates' behaviour relatively to the indicators, or a grading list. One must pay attention that the assessment is specific, maybe even giving reasons, about the project and regarding only aspects contained in the indicators. For this, it can be limited to a self-assessment and to an assessment of mates belonging to the same work group.

I think that in a collaborative activity such as this, it's useful that

• not only contents are assessed
• not only the teacher assesses

I find it's even more useful for a teacher to experiment, be it only once, on an activity whose analysis and assessment levels are necessarily so complex. It motivates, it helps to refocus one's objectives and expectations, it opens one's mind, it forces reflection. In a word, it's healthy.

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To Talia about teacher-student interaction in e-learning.

Let me post here a comment I left on this Talia's blog post.


Hi Talia. Congratulations for your excellent blog and the great ideas you give through it.
I completely agree with you on this one: establishing an e-learning environment doesn’t decrease the teacher’s workload, on the contrary!
Somehow the teacher allows students to access information, tasks, projects… even when the teacher is not there. But they will do it only if they see that the teacher is there anyway, if they understand that they are not alone, that their effort is being followed.
One of the main reasons I am exploring this field is that I want my students not to think of the subject I teach only on Wed evening because on Thu morning we have a class, something we know is not conducive to great learning, but that happens more and more frequently in my corner of the world. A virtual classroom is something that can be exciting because it resembles things students do on the net, but with a different purpose; it can help motivation, give different keys to learning… But an empty virtual classroom is as empty as a real one. Students want people to be there. Students (and parents) want their (advanced and brave) teacher to be there, always. Or at least when they are needed there.
One point I would like to hear your opinion and tips about is evaluation and assessment in e-learning. I feel a bit… clueless about this one.
I’ll keep in touch.

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Letter to parents

Translation of post "Lettera ai genitori" of April 1st 2008 on "Il deserto dei tartari 2.0".

Today I showed my principal (and the "Liceo" coordinator) the letter I intend to send to my 14-16 students' parents, to explain what the heck they are doing on the net and what we are going to do in the next few weeks.

The necessity for this comes from the decision of using a wiki with my students, on wikidot.com, and to do so it's necessary to create an email account. Since our school is not provided with this service, we shall probably have to open external accounts (I don't know, gmail o yahoo) for those students who don't already have a personal email address.

So I took the opportunity for a moment of correctness and transparency, also because the net is full of references to similar procedures when it comes to accessing the net with minors.

I think it's also a good way of involving the parents and to further motivate the students, seen that their parents will be able to appreciate their innovative work (provided they let them see it!).

I'm curious...

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Parents

Translation of post "Genitori" of March 30th 2008 on "Il deserto dei tartari 2.0".

On Classroom 2.0 a few discussions about how to manage internet-worried parents are opening.

Looks like in the States some parents (especially of younger students, primary school level) are worried that using internet exposes their children to risks.

The answers I am reading are usually optimistic: teachers involved seem convinced that sooner or later the parents will understand that their children are exposed to risks anyway, and being educated to live in a responsible and ethical way on the net is much better than falling in it completely unaware.

An interesting line of conduct is to involve as much as possible the parents in using the net together with their children. I think this goes in the direction stated before: the net is as any other place children can go, and adults should accompany them as long as they feel reasonably sure about the children's autonomy.

However, I think this is an important point: parents must know about the use is made of the internet and about which security and privacy measures are taken during these operations at school, about which tasks their children are assigned for home work and which tools they are required to use. The information can be the more effective, IMHO, the more involved, or at least open, the parents are in/to the activities; if cooperating directly with them is not possible, at least the results of their children's work can and should be shown to them. A post on one of the forums above mentioned made me smile: think fridge! What do parents proudly stick on the fridge hatch? Their children's masterpieces. Can't seeing and showing that a small piece of the net has got their children's name, or the name of their class, on it, be reason for an equal pride?

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Del.icio.us

Translation of post "Del.icio.us" of March 22nd 2008 on "Il deserto dei tartari 2.0".

Del.icio.us is a social bookmarking service. It puts together all the "favourites" of the subscribers, it recombines them, it makes statistics of them... it draws a map of the net based on the preferences of those who contribute.

In Patricia Donaghy's blog there is a good screencast (actually, once you see one, you get another dozen) about how to build a network of contacts and widen one's webliography with del.icio.us.

How does it work? Every time I bookmark a website, this is added to my page. When I look at this page I see the list of my favourite web sites, but I also see that, for example, website such is also a favourite site of 20 other people. Not only: of each of them I can see the whole list of favourites and how he/she organized them. So maybe I find out that one of these has the same interests I have, and among his favourite websites has some that I already know, but surely also many more that I haven't seen yet. So I take advantage of somebody else's experience not to surf randomly, somebody else who has something in common with me.

So I can also add this person to my network. If I look at 'my network' page I see the names of those I chose as "interests neighbours", but I also see all their favourites, from the most recent to the least. I can also be useful to my network's members: when i discover a website I'm not really interested in (if I am interested directly, I just bookmark it and my network mates will see it anyway), but I know that somebody in my network could find this site interesting, I can forward it to him directly through del.icio.us.

Charmed by this thing, I immediately tried. From the first one of my "faves" three network members sprang out and three more faves to add... Looks like a fruitful way of knowing people and resources, and a timesaver too.

Let's think of using it in a class, for example during an online quest. The students can optimize times (obviously if enough motivated) and create each his or her own network of URL's, they will organize and use at leisure...

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Online and local wikis - technical notes

Translation of post "Wiki online e in locale - note tecniche" of March 19th 2008 on "Il deserto dei tartari 2.0".

I knew hardly anything about wikis. To learn more I tried creating accounts at a couple of web sites offering free wiki spaces (pbwiki and wikispaces) and to install locally on my laptop some wiki servers: tikiwiki, dokuwiki, mediawiki.

I found pbwiki simpler, more customizable and overall more attractive, between the two candidates for a work-wiki (and I already started using it).

About local wikis, the only one that didn't give me trouble instaling on my Ubuntu box was dokuwiki, which I immediately adopted as a (network) home collaboration tool. Too bad it doesn't iron.

One of the good things of these technologies is exactly this: being able to learn by yourself, simply reading here and there and trying hands-on.

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Wikis and blogs

Translation of post "Wiki e blog" of March 17th 2008 on "Il deserto dei tartari 2.0".

In this wiki I found interesting ideas worth sharing.

Blog (from web log). An online diary where the writer (or writers) post articles or columns that are reachable, according to the settings, by anybody or by a selected group of users, and where readers (or a portion of them) can post comments taking part in a discussion. This site is a (rather poor, at present) example of a blog.

Wiki (from hawaiian, "quick", "fast"). It is a collection of structured information reachable by a set of people who can modify, edit, add to, the site's contents. Wikipedia is a (gigantic) example of a wiki.

What follows is just some night babbling of mine with no real supporting facts.

What educational uses could I find for these two lead characters of Web 2.0? The former is surely advisable for discussions, creative writing, somehow for any kind of activity where exchange and dialogue are central. Because of the journalistic form and the sequential line of posts, I think a blog could be useful for building individual distinct knowledges through sharing and discussing.

The latter is more useful in situations where there is a final goal to reach through successive approximations and in a collaborative way. Since many wiki services also offer discussion tools (for example about what a user modified), a wiki can be useful for cumulatively increasing a single unifiable collective knowledge, without a central role of chronology.

Focusing on the role of time, I notice a substantial duality of the two media: a wiki is a synchronic glance on a knowledge that is growing diachronically. A blog is a diachronic glance on different knowledges growing synchronically.

Focusing on the central element and the type of knowledge involved, a wiki is object-centered, and the object is singular (meaning that the content of a wiki is only one), whereas a blog is process-centered, and the process is plural (meaning that the knowledge-building processes are as many as the people involved).

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10 ways to use a blog

Translation of post "10 modi per usare un blog" of March 15th 2008 on "Il deserto dei tartari 2.0".

I found on the Edublogs site some suggestions about the educational use of blogs. Here's a paragraph-titles summary.

1. Post materials and resources.
2. Host online discussions.
3. Create a class publication.
4. Replace your newsletter.
5. Get your students blogging.
6. Share your lesson plans.
   
7. Integrate multimedia of all descriptions.
   
8. Organise, organise, organise.
9. Get feedback.
10. Create a fully functional website.

Obviously this is just for advertising Edublogs services. But, as a beginner blogger, I find quite interesting seeing all these possible situations when a blog or a blog-related service is suggested...

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