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Back in Philly - Educational Technology

3/31/2015

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Over the past few weeks there have been several articles in Philadelphia news in regards to technology access in the School District of Philadelphia (SDP). The unfortunate budget cuts over the past several years have served to decrease the availability had by students to computers that can really do what they want and so some compromises have been reached that allow for students to gain access to the Internet but little else. 

According to a recent article in The Notebook, "the SDP ranked second from the bottom in the average age of its computers: just over five years." As a recent transplant employee, I can attest to that being absolutely true. The last school I worked at - The Academy at Palumbo - had a computer lab with iMacs from 2010/2011 that worked fairly well - but has not been upgraded since. When I transferred from the High School of the Future in 2011, the laptops they had were already two years old and I believe they have had to make compromises on their 1:1 program for financial reasons.

The article does show some strengths of the systems at SDP: "The Philadelphia District ranks number one among Council of the Great City Schools in network bandwidth, which determines the speed at which the Internet is delivered to a computer. Every classroom is Internet-ready and all have high-speed wireless – Wi-Fi – as well." This was also true in my tenure in the District, albeit with some issues of network downtime as is normal in a large organization. Other comparison can be seen here.

The one major criticism I have that comes from the large financial strain the District has been under is the replacement technology they have had to order because it is cheaper: Chromebooks. 

These devices - while wonderful for Internet usage and online app usage - do not have the power or capability to run higher-level software that students need. During my first round of laptop fundraising in 2011, I originally wanted to order Chromebooks at a reduced rate so that I could get more of them. I soon realized that I would not be able to run programs like Microsoft Excel, Geometer's Sketchpad, or Google Sketchup/Earth that I wanted to use in my classroom. Nowadays, I have a similar program, but it is for 3D modeling programs like 123D Design and Autodesk Inventor. 

Yes, they are an inexpensive solution and can do quite a lot (especially in a District with little else), but if SDP relies on them too heavily over the next few years, it will be doing itself and its students a disservice. 

Here are two other articles with more information on the current technology situation in the School District of Philadelphia.
  • Here's what it takes to run the Philadelphia School Distirct's IT network
  • Assistive technology is a needed tool in the city's resource-starved schools


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How Student-Led Conferences leverage better relationships

3/28/2015

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Last Thursday night and Friday afternoon were the NYC Department of Education's official time for Parent Teacher Conferences in High Schools. From what I have heard most high schools treat this as sort of an open-call for parents to show up and discuss issues of their children. The DOE has suggestions of items to talk about and questions to discuss but it really could be a free-for-all if need be.

What we do differently at BCS is quite stark. We begin by changing the mindset of the process with a new name: "student-led conferences." Instead of the focus being on the parent and the teacher, the focus is on the student. We spend time during our Crew class (an advisory-like class that loops with teachers for four years) preparing for the event. We have a script where students discuss their strengths and challenges and what choices they have made up to this point that will justify the grades they have earned.

My role as a teacher is to guide the student to discuss these things with the parent or guardian and myself in present in the room. Oftentimes the meetings are straightforward: issues of attendance cause low grades so make sure the student has extra alarms in the morning; or maybe the student feels they have to justify why they received a 91 instead of a 95. Whatever the case may be, the student is sharing thoughts much more than I am or the parent is. 

Eventually, we do get to an open dialog portion of the meeting to air out concerns, discuss next steps, and share any other important information (like upcoming class trips, etc). 

The past two days have been very interesting. After working with these students for two years as their Crew leader, I know what to expect from parent reactions and I know how to focus the conversation from any deflection that might occur. At the end of sophomore year, students have a lot of data to look at and can think more seriously about the effect their GPA will have on their college options after graduation. Conversations that are redundant in a negative way are not what I am looking for so I have brought in counselors, IEP specialists, and more in order to support my students achieve success.

I only hope that over the next few months the students take the heart what they have available to them to improve or influence each other in a positive way.
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Stand up against Governor Cuomo: Say no to testing

3/21/2015

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I have not had enormous time to get involved in the opt-out movement from state testing this year due to wedding planning, but I wanted to take a moment and share some thoughts on it now. One of the main parts of New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo's proposed budget is to change how teacher evaluation is conducted. Here is the text from his 2015 Opportunity Agenda on the subject:
The Governor proposes that the teacher evaluation system be simplified and standardized. Instead of two student growth measures, we will have one. We will eliminate the local measure. Fifty percent of the score will be based on state tests, or, in the case of teachers in non-tested grades or subjects, a student growth measure that measures one year of academic growth. 

The remaining 50 percent of the score will be allocated to observations and shall include at least two. A least one observation must be conducted by an independent observer to be selected from among the following options: 1) a principal or other trained administrator from within or outside the school district; or 2) a trained independent evaluator from a list of entities with a demonstrated record of effectiveness and expertise in this area, as developed by the SED commissioner; or 3) an appointed faculty member at a State University of New York or a City University of New York school of education. Thirty-five percent of the score must be allocated to this impartial observation; the remaining fifteen percent may be allocated to an observation by a school administrator.
This small block of text would have tremendous ramifications for actions taken in the classroom daily. 

The first major thing to notice is that the Governor proposes removing local measures from evaluations. I find this to be in large error because of the lack of nuanced understanding of needs from local sources. A student in a rural area outside of Buffalo, NY, might need something very different from one the low-income Brownsville section of New York City. Without local measures of any kind, it seems very unbalanced to suggest one state test could assess the same information.

The second major thing to notice is the change of whom completes teacher observations. No longer will the majority of your score come from your principal or designee - the person who has the most knowledge of the challenges and work that you do. Instead, it will come from a third-party observer. This person may be trained in standardized observation skills, but will likely miss nuanced actions a teacher takes due to lack of knowledge of the surroundings.

The last major thing to notice doesn't come from the test above. Instead, it comes from the schedule of when the testing sessions take place. In Elementary and Middle Schools, students will be testing on April 14, 15, 16, 22, 23, and 24. If you take into account 6.5 hours of regular instruction per day, that is 39 fewer hours of class they will receive. Plus, in public schools across the state, test prep is an important part of class to make sure students are on par with their higher-income or private school compatriots and that takes even more time away from regular instruction.

If you support teachers in helping to mould future leaders and dreamers in the United States, then support the opt-out movement. There is a wonderful video from Brooklyn teachers (some of whom I work with) explaining more in detail about why it is important to us and children. Check it out here.

As a teacher says in the film:

"It's not so much a political plea that I am making. It's a plea for the future of public education in New York state."

Call and write to Governor Andrew Cuomo:

518-474-8390

or

Governor Andrew M. Cuomo
NYS State Capital Building 
Albany, NY 12224
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Pearson spies on students taking its tests

3/15/2015

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Across the United States there are teachers, parents, students, and community members initiating protests and rallies in support of the Opt-Out movement against standardized testing in public schools. This past Thursday there was a rally in front of my school to combat new policies being pushed through by Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York that would have more of teacher evaluation tied to state tests. In New Jersey, though, there are new state tests that went into effect recently and already have controversy surrounding them. Opt-Out activists are writing pieces in as many news sources as possible pushing for more students to stray away from these tests. All the while, New Jersey Education Commissioner David Hespe is suggesting we "wait and see" what results are garnered from the test.

The big issue at hand from last week, however, is that Pearson, the company who created and administers the PARCC test, has been actively monitoring social media during testing windows - a practice they ostensibly say is to reduce cheating but has been mired in controversy because many view it has a violation of student privacy.

According to their social media guidelines:
We have an active presence on social media and encourage students to use it too. It's a great way to find information and share ideas, particularly when you’re revising for exams...

Monitoring activity on social media allows us to continuously improve the service we offer...

Sharing ideas with others online can be really beneficial when you’re studying or revising. However, there are limits to the amount of information you can share, and you need to be careful not to break the rules...
This is definitely a tense situation. With modern uses of social media, sharing these kinds of things becomes ubiquitous and hard to stop - it will obvious invalidate a test if a student sees something crucial from the test and then uses that information to benefit his score. That being said, it is also pretty creepy that a multi-billion net-worth company is patrolling social media sites. 

To me, this is another reason to stop putting so much emphasis on standardized testing. It becomes much harder to enforce the "standards" that are required to make sure tests are reliable and valid. Instead, focus on spending time teaching in the classroom and make sure our students can think. That way, when they approach new situations, they won't be looking for the multiple choice answers to get them out.
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The struggle matters most in math class

3/14/2015

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It has been a few weeks since I last wrote a blog post - planning my upcoming wedding has taken over much of my free time and so I have less of a chance to keep updated on what is happening out there in education activist world. I'm trying to keep track, but it takes time that I don't have as much of anymore. Hopefully this piece can summarize some of the work I'm doing in my math class right now and I can continue writing bits and pieces here and there.



-------


Elizabeth Green, CEO of Chalkbeat New York and author of the book, Building a Better Teacher, has a lot to say about math education in the United States. In her July article in the New York Times she chronicles the attempts and failures of the US educational establishment to foment a sense of understanding in mathematics education in lieu of simple rote memorization. Over the course of the past few decades pundits have proposed various new math regimes - the most recent of which is the Common Core - in order to reach this goal. Yet, still, there are large amounts of teachers in this country that are incapable or refuse to implement research-backed methods that have better outcomes for children.


One of the major pieces of her article focused on the idea of "I, We, You" in a math classroom. According to Green, "Most American math classes follow the same pattern, a ritualistic series of steps so ingrained that one researcher termed it a cultural script." First the teacher demonstrates a method, then completes an exercise with the class, and finally the students practice on their own. This method has been used for decades and helps students memorize specific rules that they can apply in certain situations, but falters when a new problem comes up that does not fit into the pattern. The procedural knowledge that students are gaining can be useful, but only if that student can apply it in novel situations.

In an article from 2012 in Psychology Today, Dr. Nate Kornell explores a research study on how students are (or are not) assimilating this information. In his research he found that many students are still using these rules and when they are tested in new ways on topics like fractions, "some fell back on procedural knowledge, probably because that’s the only knowledge they had about fractions." Instead of a deep understanding causing a logical thought process, these students are essentially giving up on thinking, relying on memory instead. In fact, Dr. Kornell's analysis showed that "77% of the students [surveyed] seemed to believe that math was not something that could be figured out, or that made sense." 

In classrooms across the country (like the one I teach in at the Brooklyn School for Collaborative Studies) teachers are using materials like College Prep Math (CPM), providing investigation-based lessons where students have to think, write, and justify their decisions individually and in a group. These kind of lessons allow for a more nuanced approach to math education where if a student sees something new he or she will often attempt it using previous ideas and molding them to the new situation. There are no step-by-step procedures in CPM, just investigations, lab activities, justifications, etc. Lessons of this type might be called "You, Y'all, We" as they demand students to work independently and in a group before justifying their thoughts to the class.

Currently, some teachers are attending workshops and learning about investigation-based math methods like problem-based learning or other interdisciplinary approaches. Some are succeeding through tremendous odds. Others are doing a disservice to the approach by inputting old worksheets or ideas into these lessons and reforming them back to the old model. According to Dr. Kornell, these teachers, "by converting conceptual struggle into procedural learning, [are] unintentionally depriving their students of crucial elements of effective learning." 

It is imperative that our students struggle in their learning and to  share that struggle with their peers. If math education stagnates in the "I, We, You" methodology the next generation of Americans will not be able to troubleshoot and problem-solve as we would like them to. Hopefully books and articles like Green's and Dr. Kornell's will help make the difference.
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    I am a math teacher in the New York Department of Education. I infuse technology and real-world problems into my curriculum in order to prepare my students for the future. I would love for people across the country to recognize we teachers can't do it alone. If you don't believe me, come visit my classroom!

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