Some would find this purchase to be somewhat odd.  Indeed it is, somewhat.  Those who know me have heard my rants about needing a “real” keyboard.  My typing skills are not the best by any means but I seem to be able to do it faster and with fewer mistakes if I can get a tactile response that’s more than the whole device vibrating.

It’s why my last computer purchase was a tablet PC – and mind you, I don’t regret that purchase.  That computer does almost everything I intended for it to do.  I enjoyed the challenge it gave me to install and configure Linux on a computer with a touch screen, and for times that I need to use Windows (they do occur) I have to say Win 7 is the nicest version of that OS that I’ve ever seen.

But here I am, now owning a tablet.  I use it for the following things:

Netflix

It has a 10.1″ screen, which is large enough for anything I don’t intend to use at more than an arm’s length away.  To that end I’ll often go through a Dirty Jobs (or other show) marathon while grading student work on my main computer.

Audible

I love Audible for many of the same reasons I love podcasts.  I spend a decent amount of time commuting, and good audio content keeps my mind active.  My mind also tends to wander when trying to read nonfiction, so it’s a good way for me to digest that information if I have someone reading it to me.  The only downside is that since I refuse to pay for a 3G tablet I have to download the books before I head to the car, but that’s not hard to do.

Schoolwork

The first school day after I purchased my tablet I decided to see if I could leave my main computer at home.  As it turns out SchoolMax (our content management system for grades, attendance, and other student records) works just fine with any Android browser, as does Edmodo.  Edmodo even has an app for that, which I recommend.  For an intense “grade everything and grade it all now” session I still prefer a more powerful computer, but for what I normally do it works quite well.

Reading

Google Books, the Kindle App, and more are available for most tablets.  My tablet weighs about the same as some books I’ve read and much less than others.  One of the biggest selling points I can see for schools switching to a 1:1 ratio is the replacement of dead tree textbooks with digital equivalents.  Are there more reasons? Of course!  But the biggest complaint I hear about moving to a 1:1 ratio is the cost.  Tablets are cheaper than most computers, and the more $50+ textbooks they replace, the better.

Beyond that, there are several apps that make browsing online content very convenient.  I particularly like Feedly, though there are others with the same functionality.  It has the ability to sink up with my Google Reader feeds and display them in an almost magazine style format that allows me to skim through content without the usual feeling of being overwhelmed.

Games

I fully admit it, I’m a gamer.  Puzzle games, adventure games, MMORPGs, I like most categories.  There are a wide variety of games available for whatever tablet OS you care to use.  My favorite, currently, is Robo Defense.  It’s one of the few apps I have that wasn’t free, and it was totally worth it.

Next up, I’ll make a post about the things I don’t like about tablets.

PUWT Conference

Presentation (Hosted on Google Docs)

Class page

Apologies for the poor audio quality, I was projecting (using my “teacher voice”) to the participants and that tended to overwhelm my mic every time I was next to the computer.

Naturally, the first thing I thought of was the first grade kids I had been planning to teach!

Now, most of them are able to log in on their own, but most is not the same thing as all. I could have them do an online lesson, but instead I pulled out a project I had my students do a few years ago back when I didn’t have a computer lab to call my own.

With some construction paper, a little glue, and some markers/crayons/colored pencils, we’ll be making our own laptops.  The point of the lesson will be to talk about how computers are used to communicate with others online.  The end result will be a neat toy laptop to call their own.

You can do the lesson too, if you want.  the .pdf file with the instructions is here, and the printable keyboard template (2/page) is here.

So submitted for your approval is an interview of me done by Dr. Kavita Mittapalli, someone whose name I most likely just mispronounced horribly so I won’t try to say it again.

The good Doctor visited one of my 1st grade classes last week, before the whole AWOL voice incident, and recorded a conversation with me afterwards.  I rambled on, and then made the bad decision of requesting a copy of the interview.

And I still haven’t learned, as I’m now making another bad decision and playing it for you.  Enjoy.

As usual, my conference was full of fun, excitement, and learning – so much so that I forgot to take proper notes!  I did not, however, forget to post on Twitter up through the end of Tuesday’s keynote, so rather than reinvent the wheel I thought I’d copy/paste the highlights here.

The keynote itself was presented by Chris Lehmann (Website) (Twitter), principal of the Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, PA.

-=-=-=-=-=-

theartguy Aaron Smith

• Up at 4:30 / Whose bright idea was this? / Oh yeah, it was mine. #haiku #mset11

theartguy Aaron Smith

• At the conference / No one at Registration / Opens at seven. #haiku #mset11

gwynethjones gwynethjones
by theartguy

• Excited about the #MSET11 conference today! I’ll be in room 336 & the Digital Sandbox all day & come by & say hi! YAY!

theartguy Aaron Smith

• @gwynethjones My coffee’s finished! / Waiting for that caffeine rush / And Registration #haiku #mset11

theartguy Aaron Smith

• Dilemma! @gwynethjones and @thetechtiger are both presenting a Session 1! What do I do?!

theartguy Aaron Smith

• @gwynethjones It’s not personal / I just thought I’d use #haiku / Because it’s awesome. #mset11

theartguy Aaron Smith

• All good Lutherans / Come early to an event / And get a back seat #haiku #MSET11 #Keynote

theartguy Aaron Smith

• And yes that means I’m sitting in the back next to a power outlet for my laptop. #MSET11

theartguy Aaron Smith

• Listening to @chrislehmann at the #MSET11 Keynote. I like what he’s saying so far.

thetechtiger Selena Ward
by theartguy

• lousy data = lousy decisions #MSET11 keynote

theartguy Aaron Smith

• “We don’t know everything we need to know about education” Said RE: 7 students not graduating. #Mset11 keynote

theartguy Aaron Smith

• “Deliver pizza, not instruction” “We need to reclaim the language.” “We TEACH.” #MSET11 keynote

thetechtiger Selena Ward
by theartguy

• http://twitgoo.com/2390kj deliver instruction? #MSET11

theartguy Aaron Smith

• “Don’t ban cell phones. Why deny them the tools if you can’t afford the tools?” #MSET11 keynote

theartguy Aaron Smith

• “They’re going to use them anyway.” “[So teach them how to use them!]” #MSET11 Keynote

theartguy Aaron Smith

• “What are our own personal slide rules?” What are we teaching that is now outdated? #MSET11 (Depressed that he said HTML is outdated.)

theartguy Aaron Smith

• del.icio.us: ENGINEERING.com | Games & Puzzles http://bit.ly/gUTpSW

theartguy Aaron Smith

• del.icio.us: Computers For Learning – Home Page http://1.usa.gov/fG8K6n

theartguy Aaron Smith

• “Classrooms should never be defined as 4 walls & a floor.” #MSET11 keynote

theartguy Aaron Smith

• Question for @chrislehmann In drama you don’t break the 4th wall. In teaching should we even HAVE them? #MSET

theartguy Aaron Smith

• Totally amused how @chrislehmann says the word “Awesome.” Definitely shows the level of enthusiasm expected for the word. #MSET11

theartguy Aaron Smith

• “If you get 30 copies of the same thing you didn’t give a project you gave a recipe. Let them own it.” #MSET11

theartguy Aaron Smith

• “When was the last time you took your kids to a pencil lab?” Tech should be everywhere. #MSET11 keynote

theartguy Aaron Smith

• #MSET11 Keynoter @chrislehmann is using some slides from Library of Congress’ Flickr account. I’m amused.

theartguy Aaron Smith

• I think the former English teacher just invented a new word with “Probmematize Everything” #MSET11 keynote

thetechtiger Selena Ward
by theartguy

• declarationofeducation.com #teaching #MSET11 Please join the movement.

theartguy Aaron Smith

• It occurs to me that I’ve seen no fewer than 3 #MSET keynoters advocate for cell phones in school but so many schools still ban them.

-=-=-=-=-=-

And then I went to see 2 presentations by Selena Ward, but I’ll save that for my next post.

Oh yeah, games in education.  I started in Episode 174 by giving a background of what I’d done up to that point, which I suppose means that’s not when I started at all, but that’s the post I named “Part 1″ so I’m just going to leave it at that.

In Episode 175 I discussed my current thoughts about turning my own Middle School curriculum into a game, including several problems and solutions I’d encountered.  Some problems had multiple possible solutions, and I’m not quite sure which ones I’ll pick when I’m done.

Now we’re up to the errata, the extra things, the little details that help the big picture idea without making or breaking it.  Also, keep in mind the disclaimer I offered in Part 2: All of this is not yet implemented and is subject to change based on whims as well as school policies.  If my principal glares at me and says “Mr. Smith, stop being an idiot,” I’ve no choice but to salute and about face.

(FYI: My wording here is for effect.  My principal might tell me “No,” but she would word it in a much nicer way than I did.)

Quest Types

When adopting a game-themed teaching strategy, assignments become known as quests.  My students who have played any RPGs (A.K.A. Role Playing Games, such as Warcraft, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, etc.) will already be familiar with the terminology, and those who have not will still hopefully be able to make the adjustment.

Projects = Standard Quests

The word “standard” is used here only to differentiate these from other quests.  Students select these, attempt them, and if they fail they can try again.  When they succeed they get the points attributed to the quest and move on to their next chosen quest.  Students cannot get credit for completing the same Standard Quest twice, though they can attempt to redo a failed quest as many times as is necessary.  The only thing they miss out on is time.

Homework and Warm-Ups = Daily Quests

Some RPGs have a quest type known as a “Daily Quest.”  This quest is repeatable – you guessed it – once per day.  Rather than have the students copy/paste their work from previous days, these quests would be worded so that the work done would vary each time.  Sample quests could include “Write down two things you learned in class today,” “Listen to this audio file and write down what you think is the main idea,” and “Leave a comment on Mr. Smith’s blog where you ask one question about your current project.”

The quest text could be the same each day or be selected from a pool of quests, but the point is these quests are meant to be repeatable with different results each time.

Oh, and like Standard Quests, these can be repeated if failed.  They just can’t be successfully done more than once per day.

Quizzes and Tests = Boss Battles

In the “real world,” so to speak, a boss is an employer – someone who tells you what to do and (hopefully) pays you for it.  In most video games, a boss isn’t your employer.  Instead, they’re bigger, nastier enemies for you to take down.  This is compensated by earning better than normal loot and XP (experience points, remember) when you win.  My quizzes and tests fit well into this category.  Quizzes and tests as a whole are worth only a small percentage of my students’ final grade, but as I give far more projects than quizzes each assessment becomes worth more individually than any single project.

As with the quests, these boss battles should be repeatable.  If a student takes a test 20 times to pass, but then passes, then they’re showing they’ve learned the content being covered.  Getting it right the first time becomes less important than getting it right eventually.

Content Management Software

A component that has been part of my course since my first day on the job has been the submission of work online.  I just don’t see the need to require an assignment to be created on a computer, then be transferred to a dead tree, then have its grade placed back on a computer.  That middle step seems pointless and, considering the days where my wife’s health issues have kept me out of the building, a major road block at times.

I’ve tried multiple solutions for online assessment, including Drupal, Status.net, WordPress (the self-hosted version), and Edmodo.  I’ve been quite happy with WordPress, as it solved several problems I had last year with Edmodo (I’ll get into those in a little bit), is simpler to use than Drupal, and doesn’t allow the students to send private messages to each other like Status.net.  Unfortunately WordPress lacks an addon that will manage points the way I want to manage them.

Fortunately, Edmodo does that part perfectly.  Using my old grading system I chafed at the way Edmodo totaled up points when I graded assignments, but their method of counting up all the points equally will fit right in with the new standard for my class.

A previous issue I had with Edmodo, where students submitted the wrong file for a project and had to wait for me to delete their submission so they could try again, has been resolved.  Students can resubmit a project as many times as they want until I grade it.  As I won’t grade them until they’ve completed the quest, this works out very well.

My only misgiving with Edmodo at this point involves student profiles.  They have the ability to change their profiles, including their avatars to whatever they want.  This could give rise to issues ranging from inappropriate imagery to students changing their names to attempt some form of anonymity while they harass someone.  I’ve dealt with one student this year already who thought nothing of insulting other students online, and that was on a site that afforded me a lot more control over student accounts than Edmodo ever did.

That issue makes me think of proceeding with caution, but unless I find a better, more controlled solution, we’ll be using Edmodo when I start using my Game strategy.  After all, I can always set an offending account to “read-only” until the issue that made me take action is resolved.

Classes

In most RPGs, players are able to select different classes, or archetypes for their characters.  Common class examples in existing RPGs are warriors, mages, rangers, hunters, rogues, priests, paladins, and so on.  While I’m not planning on implementing this idea right away, I’m toying with eventually allowing my students to pick a class while  … um … taking my class.  Since I teach at a Creative & Performing Arts Academy, classes can align with the majors that are available.

Students could choose to be bards (for the music-themed or drama majors), artificers (visual arts), performers (drama or dance), or go with the catch-all technologists.  Each class could have specific requirements (Mandatory quests? Specific boss battles?) and / or perks (Bonus points when completing quests that align with their class?).

Naturally something this complicated will take a lot of planning to use in an effective manner, so I’m starting to think about it now, long before I intend to try it out.  With luck I’ll be able to work out the details over the summer and have students selecting classes when they take my course next year.

Well this concludes my brain-dump for now.  Rest assured there will be a Part 4, but don’t expect it right away.  I’ll write that one out when I have enough new content to make it worthwhile.

Yesterday’s post was not meant to be as long as it was. My initial goal was the content of today’s post, but as I sat down to write it I thought I’d start with an overview of where I was coming from.

Apparently a 2 paragraph introduction can be stretched into a 7 minute podcast.

In any case, as I wrapped up my “story so far” it was painfully obvious that I’d crossed the fine line between not enough information and too much detail. I saw a good stopping point and hit “Publish.”

Which brings us to today.

I’ve had people say wonderful things about my classes, but what I mainly see is room for improvement. If 90% of my kids are on task. that means a full 10% of them are distracted somehow. I need a hook to reel in that 10%, 5%, 50%, or whatever percentage that isn’t learning in my room.

And so we look at video games.

Keep in mind that this is a “behind the scenes” view of my thinking process. Nothing here has been implemented by me yet. I may think of something better. I may find out that there’s a policy preventing one facet or another. This post is a snapshot of my thoughts as of right now.

What do games have that my curriculum is lacking?

The most engaging games are ones that have some elements that are simple enough to pull you in, but others that are challenging enough to build you up.

The most engaging games have levels of progression. These levels can be different zones, game maps, scenarios, or character power. Angry Birds and World of Warcraft are not that different when you dig down deep enough.

The most engaging games forgive failure. You can play a level over again, or fight that boss battle one more time. This is very different from the current academic strategy of allowing a student only one opportunity to pass a quiz.

Make the class a game.

Something I’d heard of last year was the idea of using a points system instead of traditional grades. Students earned points (called XP, short for Experience Points) by completing various tasks and assignments, and earning certain numbers of points allowed students to “level up.” One story about a college professor was republished a lot, but with little information on how it was specifically implemented.

The WoW in School teachers implemented a system with 2,000 XP per level, so a student with 0 XP would be level 1, at 2,000 XP they would earn level 2, 4,000 would get them to level 3, 6,000 for level 4, and so on, then assigned grades at the end based on levels reached. Assignments all had point values – Journals = 250, Forums = 250, Projects 500+, and so on.

What’s the incentive?

1. Competition: Some students will want to show they’re “better” by maintaining the highest score.
2. Clear Progression: If a student gets an A on their first project, they have nowhere to go but down. Maintaining a grade is not as exciting as building one from the ground up.
3. Choose Your Own Adventure: Linear lessons are all well and good, but different students have different interests. When I’m playing Warcraft I can often pick and choose which quests I want to work on. Why not let students pick between different projects that address the same objectives?
4. Level Perks: “Congratulations, you reached Level X! You’ve earned a homework pass!” “… You’ve earned the ability to listen to YouTube while you work!” “… You’ve earned the title ‘Master Technologist!’” “You’ve unlocked an extra credit project!”

Not every one of these incentives will work with every student, but not every facet of Warcraft appeals to every player. The goal is to have enough varied incentives to appeal to a wide demographic.

Align the new standard with the old requirements.

And so we get to the tricky part. My employer uses online grading software that has very specific requirements in place to force teachers to stay on task with their grading. I’m not about to complain about this software, as I think having something that allows students and parents to stay on top of student progress throughout the school year in addition to Progress Reports and Report Cards is a fantastic idea.

It does, however, present a challenge. How do I make an XP grading system compatible with an A B C D F grading system?

One grade per week.

Teachers in my county are required to enter one or two grades per week based on how often they see their students. As my school is on an A Day / B Day schedule, I fit under the one per week category. The grade can be anything: homework, quiz, test, project, warm-up, etc., and I can always put in more than one grade per week, but I need that minimum.

The solution I came up with was to stop naming my Projects in the grading software. Instead, they’ll be “Week 1 Project,” Week 2 Project,” and so on. I’ll still require students to complete at least one project per week, but which they pick first will be up to them. When I grade the work, I’ll list the name of the actual project in the comment section in the grading software.

What’s an A?

The WoW in School teachers have said the most push back they got was from parents who still wanted to measure student progress by traditional letter grades. Saying “Well your daughter’s a Level 5 Technologist” can get looks of confusion compared to “She has a B.”

One solution to this is to assign grades based on levels. Let’s say for example that the maximum level possible from doing all the work is 20. I could say that all students that are level 18, 19, or 20 have an A. All students that are level 16 and 17 have a B, and so on.

The second option, and perhaps the one involving the least amount of work, would be to just let the grading software figure it out. Let the students pick their quests (projects), if they complete them they get the points. I hesitate to use this system as my limited math skills tell me that everyone who participates will simply get an A regardless of the effort put forth.

Another possibility is to let the students reach whatever level they can to determine the maximum level possible (less math for me), then have the top 10% have an A, the next 10% down have a B, and so on. Everyone will still have the chance to earn an A if they all get within that top 10%. The down side will be that it’s grading on a curve, and in the past I’ve disliked any grading system where one enterprising student could “wreck the curve” by outperforming the rest of the class. To prevent that from happening I’d have to include some form of weekly XP cap to prevent someone from hitting level 300 in the first week and therefore demotivate the rest of the class.

Well once again I’ve reached the point where my own eyes are beginning to glaze over and my ADD is kicking in. I’ll include the rest of my thoughts in Part 3.

Those who have read my blog or listened to my podcast for any length of time are no doubt aware that I’m a fan of using games as a conduit for learning.

I’m not talking about the “Educational Games” market, that will certainly dominate a large part of the Vendor area at this year’s MSET (I’m presenting again, yay!), though some of those are good too.  No, I’m talking about the games that kids (and adults)  choose to play because of compelling content.

Don’t think those games have educational value?  Well I didn’t think art would help me with my math skills either, but I’ve learned and retained more about measurement, geometry, fractions, and graphing from my years as a visual artist than I ever did in a traditional math classroom.  True, the information wasn’t crammed into me the same way in my art classes as it was in my math classes, but I think that was part of the problem.

An engaged student (of any age) is a learning student.  Once that hook is in deep, it’s the teacher’s job to facilitate the learning.  How the student gets engaged is the tricky part, but fortunately game companies have been working for years on churning out all kinds of games that people love to play.  Why? Because failure there leads to bankruptcy unless you’re making educational games and can convince people to buy your products anyway “because it’s educational.”

(Please note that is not a jab at all educational games.  I have seen many good ones and use some of them in my classes, but I’ve seen enough bad ones to be somewhat spiteful that those products have neither improved or gone away.)

So … games as a conduit for learning.

This is not an original idea of mine.  There’s some really cool people who are thinking the same thing.  The problem, however, is that it’s a new idea, and the realm of education is a slow, lumbering beast that learns new skills slowly.  Many textbooks still say Pluto is a planet and that Bush is still President of the United States.

I’m not the first to think of using games more in my classes, but my work isn’t even cut out for me.  It’s time to grab my scissors.

Early experiments:

I started off three years ago in my last position by introducing select students to Sploder.com.  Their age and other factors had us only use the free demo that did not allow for the work to be saved, but the results were promising.  My students did not just design easy games or hard games, but instead set out to create a game that was just challenging enough to be fun.  When they tested their games they evaluated the difficulty levels of their creations based on their own abilities, and added or removed monsters, power-ups, allies, and so on to make the game better from their own viewpoint.

Sure, some started off making a level they could win instantly, but they found that just wasn’t fun after the first couple of plays.  They weren’t engaged until there was a challenge.

WoW In School

I sort of hovered around the “Sploder” level of expertise until late last school year when I learned about the World of Warcraft in School Program.  Here were teachers using a commercially popular game to engage their kids and use it to teach mathematics, language arts (They’re reading The Hobbit as a parallel assignment to in-game tasks), and internet safety.

I won’t go so far as to say that Warcraft is the best choice for every classroom, or even one classroom per school, but the gains they’ve made in their program are noticeable and the comments from their detractors have clear and measured responses.  (Example: Those against WoW in school because of the violent nature of the game have never seen a football player in high school require multiple surgeries on his knees after several in-game accidents.)

Be that as it may, I’m not quite ready to push for a Warcraft themed curriculum in my building.  This is more from my wallflower-ish nature (and some legitimate budgeting concerns) than any argument I’ve seen against the program.

Minecraft

I first learned about Minecraft several months ago when a few videos made using the game went viral, but did not try the game for myself until one of my students started talking about it in class.  I waited until the weekend, tried the free version, and within two hours had paid for the full version.  On Monday I yelled at the student for getting me hooked on another video game.

He laughed.

So cruel.

I even made an effort to include Minecraft in some of my lessons, as I showed in a recent podcast.  They were fledgling attempts to find out what would work, but the results were promising.

Now I’ve expanded my lessons around the game to include creating a “skin” for a Minecraft avatar and using other web based 3D editors to plan out what they intend to create in the game.

The Next Level: Make the Class a Game

This is my latest endeavor.  I’ll talk about this in Games in Education Part 2.

Apologies for the size of the download (Nearly 50 MB, ouch!), but I unfortunately couldn’t make it smaller without losing a lot of the quality.  Video is like that.

• My county’s Sharing Technology with Educators Program, or S.T.E.P.
• My new favorite Android App (still), AndRecorder, which I keep calling “AndRecord” because long names are abbreviated below my little phone icons.
• Gimp.org, because it’s free and awesome.
• SumoPaint.com, because it as well is free and awesome.
• Frames, because while it is not free, it is still awesome.
• A rant against looking for things because they “work in the classroom.”  That’s great if we’re preparing our students for spending the rest of their lives in our classrooms, but there’s that “real world” thing going on outside.  Getting something to work in the classroom is good and necessary, but we should be finding and using things that will work outside of our classrooms as well as in them.

Next quarter will be different.  Why? Because it has to be.

Oh, and the programming language I couldn’t remember? Scratch.

Want to know a secret?  A deep, dark secret that I’ve kept off this blog for over a year now?  One that will shock you?

Well, too bad.  I’m going to tell you anyway.

Ready?

Here I go …

I’m not a part of my school’s Art Department.

Yeah, that shocks me, too.  Here’s a guy whose screen name on an umptillion of Web 2.0 sites is “The Art Guy,” who may or may not have been the first art teacher podcaster (at the time I started I couldn’t find another one … that’s far from the case now of course), who isn’t even a part of his own school’s Art Department.

How’d THAT happen?

It’s a bureaucratic issue, to be honest.  I teach in a computer lab in a K-8 Arts Academy.  If it was a high school, I’d be a Computer Graphics teacher.  Unfortunately there is no course number for such a class in middle school, let alone elementary.

Instead, I teach a class called Technology Concepts.  It’s a fun class to teach, if you’re as geeky as I am, but it’s not inherently an art course.  Therefore, I  have no reason (on paper, at least), to be a part of the Art Department.  Instead, I’m a part of the Enrichment Department.

It’s not so bad…

I recently was chatting online with a former coworker from a previous school, and she lamented my change of departments.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, “You’re far too talented to not be teaching art!”

At that point I puffed out my chest and my head swelled with pride – and not just because she said I had talent.

“Oh, I’m still teaching art.  Do you honestly think I could stop teaching art if I tried?”

Of course she could not.

I’m an art teacher. I teach art.

Your definitions may vary, but in my book, ART is anything that involves creativity.  I don’t care if it’s a painting, story, play, song, dance, or video game.  An ARTIST is anyone who creates art, and an ART TEACHER is anyone who teaches students how to be artists.

I’m a teacher at a Creative & Performing Arts Academy.  Whatever subject is taught by any teacher, they had darned well better be teaching art as well or they don’t belong there.

Math is art.

Science is art.

Social studies is art.

Reading/Language Arts is art to the point that the R/LA Department should be part of the Art Department as well!

Conclusion

Does it sting a bit to know I’m not part of a department named for my degree and certification?  Yes, yes it does.  But it doesn’t change what I teach.

Art is universal.  Only the styles and media change.

And I’m an art teacher.

No, no that’s not true.  For me, School started several weeks ago when I came in during the Summer to put my lab back together.  (The custodial staff needed me to break it down so they could move the desks and wax my floors.)

I found out only recently that many of the students I had last year will also be returning.  I met this news with mixed feelings.  First, I had some awesome kids last year.  There was more than one time that I took student work to my principal and said “This is why I need majors.”  Seriously, we’re an Arts Academy.  We have dance, drama, visual art, chorus, media production, band, AND orchestra majors – why not computer graphics, too?

That may happen in the future, but for now the red tape is in the way.

Unfortunately, for every student who was absolutely thrilled to have my class there was another who was only there because the Guidance dept. needed to give them an elective.

I don’t fault students for not being thrilled with technology.  It’s my passion, it doesn’t have to be everyone’s.  I was, however, concerned about credit.  There have been two other occasions where I’ve had students put in a class after they had already earned credit.  In one case discipline problems were a concern.

But then again, I’ve been assured that if the students couldn’t get credit for taking Technology Concepts a second time the scheduling software wouldn’t have let them into my class.

And it’s not like I’m teaching all the same lessons again, either.  As technology and my own skill sets evolve, so do the projects I assign.  Granted, some lessons will be repeated – every class starts with students using PowerPoint to introduce themselves to the class – but others were already on the chopping block not because they were old news to the students (I didn’t know I’d have returning students yet), but because they were old news to me.

The media we use will still be the same.  Students will still create animations, avatars, wallpapers, posters, and more.  I don’t think I’m wrong for repeating those things so long as there’s something new about them.  After all, I doubt the chorus majors will be saying “But we sang songs LAST year!”

I just have to keep things interesting, but you know what?

I think I just might be able to do that.

The photo above is the front wall of my school.  On the day I stopped by to interview for my position (one of the best career choices I ever made, in my honest opinion), I saw this wall and thought “If I was a few decades younger, I’d try climbing that.”

Indeed, with all of those bricks pushed away from the flat surface, this wall was full of hand holds and toe holds.  Perfect for climbing, except for the concrete and asphalt below you.

No, I never tried to climb that wall.  After a childhood accident where I fell off a porch railing and broke a wrist I decided not to climb things where I could severely hurt myself.  (I did later go cliff diving – repeatedly – but water landings aren’t so bad.)

Flash forward to our school’s end-of-the-year field day celebration.  A couple enterprising students looked at that wall and had the same thoughts I had – without the “Oh, we could probably really hurt ourselves” thoughts to go with them.

Fortunately these students were far from unsupervised, and stern words and looks managed to stop them before they got more than a couple feet off the ground.

So what does this have to do with education?

Everything.

My experience kept me from climbing that wall, and my experience kept those students from doing the same.  They hadn’t yet learned that the benefit of climbing that wall (“Look how high I am!” “Look what I can do!”) was overshadowed by the drawback of a potential injury.

Switch gears to a Kindergarten classroom, where the teacher has decided not to let her kids use oil pastels because the benefits of learning a new media do not (in his or her mind) outweigh the drawbacks of potential hard to clean messes.

Switch again to a classroom where students are not allowed to create blogs because the perceived risks (Do I have to list them?) don’t outweigh the perceived benefits.

I’ve seen many teachers, administrators, and parents that thought of climbing a brick wall with no safety gear in the same light as student blogging, cell phones in schools, oil pastels in Kindergarten, or even letting special needs students use scissors.

What’s the difference?

The difference is that we as teachers would be fools to ignore taking proper precautions before a learning activity.

I’ve blogged about this before.

I argue that it’s not the same thing if we keep safety in mind.  Let the Kindergarten students use oil pastels after setting out “placemats” (newspaper works fine) and reminding them that when a color is done it goes back in the box.  Let students blog in a moderated setting, perhaps even in a “walled garden” environment where only the students, school employees, and parents can see what’s being said.

When a student wants to climb a wall, for goodness’ sake give them a helmet, safety line, and something soft to land on.

Then cheer with them when they see how high they can go.

The last time I attended a session on using games in education I was under whelmed, but I think that was more from the presenter than the subject.  I am cautiously optimistic.

• First paper handout I’ve seen this conference.  Printed PowerPoint slides.
• “Let’s start with your Door Prize!  … I left it at home.”  It was cards for a contest for a game called “Legend of Zork.”
• In games the teacher is the guide and students learn through exploration.
• “Mirrors how humans think and how the mind works.”
• His slides are walls of text.  I don’t think it’s hurting his presentation too much though.  He’s not just reading the slides, and paging through the handout shows that these are just to front-load background information.
• Gaming appeals to multiple intelligences. (Yay, Gardner!)
• “Teaches without its main purpose as teaching.”
• Can be used to train in low-risk environments. Military, Aviation, Medical, Financial, and so on.
• Motivation, Instructional Strategy, Closure, Assessment, Review, Reteach.
• Current slide is showing the cover of GTA4 (very violent, not for kids) and the hunting scene from Oregon Trail (with LOTS of dead animals).
• Gaming DOES NOT EQUAL babysitting.  (Same deal with TV, movies, Discovery Education Streaming, etc. – It needs a purpose!)
• “The teacher has to be there to guide and direct.”
• Use careful and deliberate search terms to find high quality educational games.
• Showing a sample game on composting from http://bravekidgames.com/
• Lore of the Labyrinth from Thinkport.  I think I’ve seen this game presented at this conference before.  It teaches math but not in a dry style.
• http://shodor.org/activities/ for High School students.
• Quia – pay to make games but play them for free.  I’ve toyed with this before.  They have a free trial.
• Thinkfinity.org – Engineering
• Showing data concerning gaming activity.  Students did not just enjoy it, they also spent more time engaged in the lesson.
• “I’m not saying it should always be used, I’m saying it’s a good tool and at least as effective as other strategies.”

• Honestly, could anyone who knows me expect me to attend any other session?  It’s Art! It’s Technology! This is what I do.
• Demonstrating Voicethread used to teach a lesson on drawing a human face.
• “At this point they haven’t thrown me out.” Said RE: How many Voicethread pages she has.
• 5th graders drew self portraits then turned them into contour line drawings and learned about Andy Worhol.
• “Why do you think we need to do this in contour?”
• They reproduced their drawings on the computer.  No scanning or photography?  Would be nice to have the time for that.  In my case I may have to use something like this to digitise student work.
• Showing Art Content Standards.  Yes, this is an art lesson!  It’s not just token “Let’s color something and say we did art!”
• Showing lots of Pop Art.  Comment about how things that Warhol thought were important are not recognised by today’s kids.  Interesting snapshots of the culture at the time.
• So apparently Voicethread lets you record video with your voice.  That could be helpful for students who are ESOL or have certain disabilities.  Seeing someone’s lips move as they talk can certainly help to aid comprehension in some cases.  (It helped me in college, especially with some professors who had strong accents.)
• A cow is used to signal clean-up time.  Students expect it and are used to the routine.  Makes me wonder how I might implement a similar strategy – perhaps with a school mascot?
• Students used the paint brush tool in Pixie to redraw their line drawings.
• Copy/paste used to get 4 identical panels, then the panels were colored separately with the paint bucket.  (Watch out for cracks!  The colors will leak through!)
• While this was done with Pixie, I see how this could be done with other art programs.  GIMP, SUMOPaint, TuxPaint, Frames, even!  … Am I starting to sound like a broken record?
• “Zoho” used to embed art on a site for parents to see progress.
• Showing an example made starting with a photo.  Apparently the photo needs to be “glued” to keep it from fading.  I imagine layer settings could protect it in GIMP/Photoshop/SUMOPaint.
• “Photoshop is a little advanced for 5th grade.”  Not if my 3rd graders are making vector graphics in Frames.  Give me a day or two and they can do it.
• A conference is not worthwhile if you don’t find something you can take with you and use the next school day.  This presentation is all I need for MSET to be worth it, and it’s only the 2nd session!  Can we say this is an awesome conference? Yes we can!

This is possibly one of the smallest rooms I’ve ever been in, and there are few if any empty chairs.  Meanwhile the walls are doing little to block out the noise of convention center staff moving things around.  Nevertheless, the show must go on.

• Created her first animation using Layers in Photoshop, but her school didn’t have Photoshop.
• Switched to placing images in PowerPoint.
• Suggests PlayDoh for claymation.  If the lesson takes a while the PlayDoh can dry out, even with sealing it regularly though.  Parafin based clays can be purchased at craft stores and never dry out.
• Make sure slides are imported in order – some programs have a fit and put slide 10 in front of slide 2 because 1 is more than 2, right?  Watch for that.
• Still suggesting Photoshop or Photoshop Elements.  On a shoestring budget I’ll use GIMP.org or SUMOPaint.com.
• Images not in the rectangle for a PowerPoint slide will not show up.  GREAT way to organise elements that will be moving in or out of the frame later.
• “Insert -> Duplicate Slide, then move something.” Repeat ad nausium, but it WORKS and students can understand it.
• What’s also good about this is if students make the switch to Frames these skills should carry over.  Frames is more powerful than PowerPoint but PowerPoint will get the job done with most of the tools you need.
• PowerPoint 2008 no longer supports photo editing?  Ugh, didn’t they learn when Apple cut features out of iMovie?  Hm, apparently they did but they learned the wrong lesson.
• Word Art to make titles for your animation – more flexibility than using the built in title generator in iMovie or MovieMaker.
• “Save As -> Select JPEG.”  Check “Save All” and change the name to prevent overwriting.  A simple “ver1,ver2, ver3″ is enough.
• “Save often.”  Good advice for almost any lesson.
• When you import your slides in set the timing for as short as possible and turn Ken Burns Effect off!  Honestly, that effect is overused and makes your animation into an earthquake simulation.
• You don’t need to use clip art – you can draw things with Autoshapes, also.
• Animations imported into PowerPoint will not be animated when exported as JPEG files.  Don’t bother playing with transitions in PowerPoint.
• “Do we have enough time?” We have 20 minutes left.  She breezed through.
• The video she’s showing is very amusing and a mix of live action and animation.
• Did she just call GIMP “Free shareware?”  She did.  It’s not shareware.  It’s just free.

I thought it was worth tweeting, and apparently I think it’s worth a blog post as well because here we are.

On the surface it’s a very upbeat video.  “I can do this!”  “You can do this!”  The part that’s left out is the part that belongs to the viewer.

Each of us brings to every new experience all of our baggage.  Our previous education, experiences, likes, dislikes, and so on all flavor how we react to something new.  This can make us more or less inclined to enjoy the new things we encounter.

Having grown up with the idea of a particular type of vampire, for example, I am less inclined to enjoy the concept of vampires introduced in a certain popular series of books and movies.  (I still maintain that Vampire + Sunlight = Charcoal.  Glitter is not in the equation.)

A student introduced to a certain author or story genre in an academic setting may become soured towards those things if they dislike that classroom environment.

A teacher may avoid technology integration in their classroom if the examples they see implemented are too complex to understand, require too much additional work to pull off, or (in a worst case scenario) involve someone getting punished in some way for implementing the integration incorrectly.

And I begin to get to my point.

When I was a traveling visual arts teacher, I enjoyed the fact that I was not only demonstrating easy ways to integrate the arts but also easy ways to integrate technology. Slideshows, DE Streaming, audio, video, document cameras, and more were thrown in whenever I could do it quickly and easily.  In some cases I – the itinerant – was using equipment that the teachers based in those buildings never touched, because they didn’t know it was there or didn’t think it would be better than the old way of doing things.

Now that I am in the same computer lab for the entire day I’m actually much more isolated than I was before, but I can still get a sense of what’s going on.  Now, as before, I enter classrooms to see computers collecting dust or surrounded by enough books and boxes to make it obvious they haven’t been used in a while.  I see SMART Boards and document cameras pushed aside in the corner of a room.  I see LCD projectors that have been used more often to show movies during indoor recess than to actively engage students in learning activities.

On the other hand, there are also plenty of teachers in my building that enjoy using their SMART Boards on a daily basis and are having their students use them, too.  There are teachers that encourage their students to use online resources both in and outside of the classroom.  There are teachers that frantically contact me when their LCD projectors are not working properly, because their lessons depend on them.  There are teachers coming to me and asking for advice on how to get their students blogging, how to create online quizzes, and how to have students submit assignments digitally.  And the number of teachers who are like this is growing.

Why?  Because the teachers in my building are sharing with each other.  They attend their collaborative planning meetings every week and talk about how useful these tools are, and the other teachers decide to give it a try for themselves.

No one day professional development session that I’ve seen will make as much of a difference as one impassioned person who likes to show off what they can do with these awesome tools on a frequent basis.  They are enough to get others to try it, and from there it spreads exponentially.

This is a far cry from a former principal of mine (whom I will not name) who attended a MICCA (now MSET) conference only to say “It’s a shame we can’t do any of that here.”  (As someone who has presented at MICCA for years on what I’d been doing with my own classes I wondered what sessions she attended.)

So what are you doing?  Are you trying new things? Bragging about what works? Trying to fix what doesn’t work?  Showing others how the costs of integration are far outweighed by the benefits?  If you’re not letting others know how technology works for you, you’re not doing enough to help the next generation.

We all bring our prior experiences with us.  At your next collaborative planning, bring some good ones.