Dangerously Irrelevant

Calling all bloggers! - Leadership Day 2009

Since the past two have been so successful, I am putting out a call for people to participate in Leadership Day 2009. As I said two years ago:

Many of our school leaders (principals, superintendents, central office administrators) need help when it comes to digital technologies. A lot of help, to be honest. As I’ve noted again and again on this blog, most school administrators don’t know

• what it means to prepare students for the 21st century;
• how to recognize, evaluate, and facilitate effective technology usage by students and teachers;
• what appropriate technology support structures (budget, staffing, infrastructure) look like or how to implement them;
• how to utilize modern technologies to facilitate communication with internal and external stakeholders;
• the ways in which learning technologies can improve student learning outcomes;
• how to utilize technology systems to make their organizations more efficient and effective;
• and so on…

Administrators’ lack of knowledge is not entirely their fault. Most of them didn’t grow up with these technologies. Many are not using digital tools on a regular basis. Few have received training from their employers or their university preparation programs on how to use, think about, or be a leader regarding digital technologies.

So… let’s help them out.

Guidelines

On Sunday, July 11 12, 2009, blog about whatever you like related to effective school technology leadership: successes, challenges, reflections, needs, wants, etc. Write a letter to the administrators in your area. Post a top ten list. Make a podcast or a video. Highlight a local success or challenge. Recommend some readings. Do an interview of a successful technology leader. Respond to some of the questions below or make up your own. If you participated in years past, post a follow-up reflection. Whatever strikes you. The official hashtag for your post and/or Twitter is

#leadershipday09

Please also link back to this post to ensure that I find yours. If you don’t have a blog, comment on someone else’s post and/or send your thoughts to me and I will post them for you. I will do a summary afterward of what folks wrote and talked about [bloggers, this means some new readers probably will head your direction; this is a blog carnival for technology leadership!].

Some prompts to spark your thinking

• What do effective K-12 technology leaders do? What actions and behaviors can you point to that make them effective leaders in the area of technology?
• Do administrators have to be technology-savvy themselves in order to be effective technology leaders in their organizations?
• What are some tangible, concrete, realistic steps that can be taken to move administrators forward? Given the unrelenting pressures that they face and their ever-increasing time demands, what are some things that administrators can do to become more knowledgeable and skilled in the area of technology leadership?
• Perhaps using the new National Educational Technology Standards for Administrators (NETS-A) as a starting point, what are the absolutely critical skills or abilities that administrators need to be effective technology leaders?
• What strengths and deficiencies are present in the new NETS-A?
• What is a technology tool that would be extremely useful for a busy administrator (i.e., one he or she probably isn’t using now)?
• What should busy administrators be reading (or watching)?
• How can administrators best structure necessary conversations with internal or external stakeholders?
• How should administrators balance enablement with safety, risk with reward, fear with empowerment?

Here are the ABSOLUTELY EXCELLENT posts from the past two years

• Leadership Day 2007 – Summary
• Leadership Day 2008 – Summary

A badge for your blog or web site

Please join us for this important day because, I promise you, if the leaders don’t get it, it isn’t going to happen.

NECC - Resources for those of you who missed the circus

Did you miss the extravaganza this year? Wish you were at NECC 2009 but couldn’t make it? Hate NECC and want to snipe from afar? Here are some resources that should help…

• If you want unofficial, raw (dare I say authentic?) coverage, many of us tagged our blog posts with necc09 or necc or necc2009 or ebc09 or edubloggercon.
• If you’re looking for more official coverage, see all of the posts at ISTE Connects and read the conference newspaper, the Daily Leader.
• Some of the sessions were filmed. Check out the videos at ISTEVision.
• If you’re interested in a particular session, the presenter may have uploaded his or her handouts.
• You can sift through the many thousands of photos on Flickr tagged necc09 or ebc09 or edubloggercon or ccdc09.
• Watch the video interviews at the Bloggers’ Cafe. I love it when Lisa Thumann says, “Helloooo, Joe!” [Oh, and VERY uncool of Joe to completely dismiss the Internet access issues.]
• For the brave (or foolish) who want to read through all of the tweets, the official Twitter hashtag was #necc09. See also #ebc09 and #edubloggercon and #neccunplugged and #necc09mg and #notatnecc09.

My final thoughts on NECC 2009

• A big THANK YOU to everyone who said kind things about my presentations. I believe that both my Monday afternoon (Effective leadership in an era of disruptive innovation) and Tuesday morning (Why aren’t you having a bigger impact?) sessions were filmed and will be available online. I’ll post the links as soon as I have them.
• As usual, Edubloggercon and the Bloggers’ Cafe were the places to be for fun, stimulating, thoughtful conversation. A big shout-out to everyone I met and/or hung out with in those two locales. If I never attend a formal NECC presentation again, y’all are still worth the price of admission. Steve Hargadon took a fair amount of heat for last year’s Edubloggercon. This year I heard nothing but praise. Steve, you don’t hear it enough but thanks for all that you do. This year’s event was FABULOUS.
• There may have been someone at NECC who was funnier than Dean Groom but if there was, I didn’t meet him/her. Thanks for all the laughs, Dean!

Photo credit: Waiting, Dean Shareski

Finally, for your viewing pleasure, David Warlick’s Edubloggercon ‘09 Animoto, which I think captures the informal, conversational nature of the experience quite nicely. See you next year in Denver!

NECC - Vendor excess (aka Do pink Cadillacs really sell printers?)

I am by no means anti-corporation. And many companies have been very good to me and CASTLE. And I know they’re an important part of the NECC convention each year. And yet, when I went into the NECC 2009 vendor hall today, I was struck by the sheer extravagance of many of the booths: exhibits two or three stories high, a bistro, a singing Elvis, giant computers hanging from the ceiling like Damocles’ sword, an enormous white cave, a two-part neon-illuminated complex that was larger than my backyard, and more…

I’m not the only one who left a little unsettled:

The Bloggers' Cafe is buzzing and Twitter has been all-#NECC09-all-day.

For the most part, it seems like the educators here are mostly interested in access, connection, and sharing info via Web 2.0.

I didn't find a single booth downstairs that talked about any of those things. [Shelly Blake-Plock]

I can’t quite put my finger on what I felt down there today. A little sick at the waste / uselessness of it all (is bringing a pink Cadillac really going to help OKI sell more printers? do they have data on that?)? A wish for more substance and and genuine engagement and less flash?

Maybe it was just such a sharp contrast to the authentic interactions I felt I was having with folks in the Bloggers’ Cafe. Or maybe my crap detector was just on high alert…

Photo set: NECC 2009 Vendors

NECC - NETS-A Release Celebration

Here are my notes from the National Educational Technology Standards for Administrators (NETS-A) Release Celebration here at NECC 2009 in Washington, DC.

• The new NETS-A are a big update from the previous NETS-A. They emphasize change, should be a systemic road map for leaders, and also are designed to be aligned with the recently-refreshed NETS-S and NETS-T.
• Here are the new NETS-A standards:
• Visionary leadership
• Digital-age learning culture
• Exellence in professional practice
• Systemic improvement
• Digital citizenship
• Intel: across countries, the building and/or district leader can either be a huge catalyst or a huge barrier. [Like I’ve said time and time again, “if the leaders don’t get it, it doesn’t happen”]

NECC - No Internet in Blogger's Cafe, NECC Unplugged - WRONG ANSWER

The Internet’s down here at NECC 2009. “Too many people – it overloaded the system” has been the response.

WRONG ANSWER. The convention center knew 14,000 techies were coming. If it couldn’t handle the bandwidth need, it shouldn’t have accepted the contract. Unacceptable response by the convention center.

I asked some ISTE people (staff? volunteers?) here in the hallway when the Internet will be back up and available. They said a reboot was occurring and hopefully everything would be fine in another 15 minutes. I said, “Okay. Well, sorry. I’m sure you’re taking some heat for this.” They shrugged their shoulders indifferently and said, “Oh, it’s no problem. We’re not worried about it.”

WRONG ANSWER. Indifferent to the Internet needs of the 14,000 techies who paid a boatload of money to attend the conference and who have expectations about access to the Web? Unacceptable response by ISTE.

Remember – your organization is only as good as the people who interact with your clients or the public…

UPDATE: I am pleased to announce that the Internet is back up again. Thanks, ISTE. Everyone, cross your fingers that it lasts!

NECC - You want coverage of Malcolm Gladwell? We got it (both good and bad)!

Count ‘em: Four, yes four, CoverItLive sessions for Malcolm Gladwell’s keynote at NECC 2009 in Washington, DC:

• Kristin Hokanson
• ISTE Connects
• TechChicks
• TeachPaperless

If you can’t figure out what Gladwell talked about after looking at all of these, there’s no helping you!

The Twitter hashtag for Gladwell’s talk was #necc09mg – you can read everyone’s comments there or at #necc09. Most tweets were restatements and note-taking. Many were positive. Some weren’t. The pushback already has begun. Personally, I love what is happening now that everyone can have a voice, but I also have to note that this is one reason why academics are very reluctant to embrace social media. They are NOT used to having much pushback on their ideas, particularly from “the masses!”

 

NECC - Constructivist Celebration

These are my notes from the 3rd annual Constructivist Celebration, hosted by Gary Stager at Sidwell Friends School in Washington, DC.

Gary Stager

• 150 participants here today
• See constructivistconsortium.org/books for constructivist teaching resources
• Tags/hashtags = constructivist celebration, constructivist consortium, #ccdc09
• Good ideas are incredibly fragile, bad ideas are timeless
• Regardless of what we’re asking educators, the level of resistance is relatively constant over time (so why not ask a lot more of the rest?)
• Computers are knowledge machines that allow you to go further than you could go on your own
• Educational computing is about software, not hardware, because software ultimately determines what you can do
• The only question we should be asking about computers in schools is “what are students doing with the computers?”
• Are the students programming the computer or is the computer programming them?
• Who has agency in the learning process?
• microworlds.com - design video games, not just consume them
• Getting the computer to do something it doesn’t already do is an important life skill
• Elements of an effective project
• Purpose
• Time
• Personally meaningful
• Complex, including serendipity
• Connected
• Discipline
• Reflection
• Shareable
• Access and constructive materials
• “Can you build an amusement park for kids?” is a more authentic, meaningful question/project than “Martin Luther King had a dream. What dream do you have?”
• Questions worth asking
• Is the problem solvable?
• Is the project monumental or substantial?
• Who does the project satisfy?
• What can they do with that?
• Less is more
• A good prompt is worth 1,000 words – if these are in place, you can do lots more than you expected
• A good prompt, challenge, problem or motivation
• Appropriate materials
• Sufficient time
• Supportive culture (including expertise)
• Maybe we should be adopting an artist’s aesthetic more often – is the work beautiful, thoughtful, personally meaningful, sophisticated, whimsical, shareable with a respect for the audience, enduring? does it move you? (we should ask more: “why should anyone have to sit through that crap?”)
• Good project-based learning (PBL) has a fighting chance of being enduring
• Technology matters
• When students come back years later and say “Remember when we … ?”, they never finish the sentence with “used all of those vocabulary words in a sentence” or “studied so hard for the state assessment” – it’s invariably some enduring project that they remember

Melinda (Lindy) Kolk

• Learning happens when children make things
• If students can text message their friends to get the answers, we’re asking the wrong questions
• Let’s focus on knowledge construction, not reproduction
• More than one right answer
• Collaborative
• Student-centered
• Requires high-level thinking

Peter Reynolds (author of The Dot and Ish)

• Great teachers notice kids
• Great teachers are not about managing data, they’re about loving kids
• Great teachers have an idea first and notice it later
• It’s not a tiger, but it’s ‘tigerish’ – the ‘ish’ concept tells the world ‘back off, I’m trying to figure this out, and right now this is the way I do it’ – gives us some room to play, experiment, LEARN
• Expose kids to big ideas and encourage them to have big ideas
• We often ask ‘what do you do?’ – we should ask ‘what’s your misssion?’ – adults often have trouble answering this – the sooner we ask that of kids, the better
• The best children’s books are wisdom dipped in story – they move you somehow
• There are so many kids out there that don’t get captured by the testing camera
• Be brave about your own artwork and be nice about others’ artwork

NECC - Thumbs up for unconferences!

The sign of a good unconference is when every session you attend goes over time, people don’t want to leave, conversation pushes into the next scheduled session, etc. EVERY session I attended today was like this. Awesome (and thank you, Steve)!

Now, how do I get this format as part of the annual educational leadership professors conference?

NECC - Edubloggercon, Web 2.0 Smackdown, Chicks That Click

NECC ‘09 and Edubloggercon ‘09 are underway! We had a quick intro from Steve Hargadon, then broke into sessions. I stayed for Vicki Davis’ Web 2.0 Smackdown. Here are the tools and resources that people showed:

• Vicki Davis, demonstrated Diigo Lists.
• John Costilla, demonstrated QR Codes.
• Rushton Hurley, demonstrated FreshBrain.
• Lisa Thumann, demonstrated Google Labs Similar Images Search.
• Angela Maiers, demonstrated CompFight, FlickrStorm. and Wibe7.tv.
• Kristin Hokanson, demonstrated CoverItLive.
• Jane Krauss, demonstrated a “thinkspace” for those of us who help others with Web 2.0.
• Adam Frey, demonstrated Wikispaces tags.
• David Jakes, demonstrated Fur.ly and Issuu.
• Scott McLeod, demonstrated Twoogle, Twitalzyer, Retweetist, and David Pogue’s article on typing expansion software (EVERYONE should be using this kind of software!).
• Leigh Zeitz, demonstrated Woot!
• Wes Fryer, demonstrated the K12 Online Conference and EdTechTalk.
• Lee Kolbert, demonstrated Tag Galaxy.
• Maria Droujkova, demonstrated TinEye.
• Chris Chater, demonstrated Noteflight and JamStudio and the Opus09 Ning.
• Jim Gates, demonstrated the WolframAlpha Firefox extension.
• Chad Lehmann, demonstrated the iPhone app Bump.
• Craig Nansen, demonstrated Tinypaste and Today’sMeet.
• Kevin Honeycutt (via Skype from a train in Missouri), demonstrated his new Web 2.0 keychain and album.

I’m now in a small break-out discussion regarding the lack of female students’ interest in technology / computer science careers (and also science, math, etc.)!

Recent publicity for me and CASTLE - Edutopia, T.H.E. Journal, Fort Dodge Messenger, ISU Talk About IT & College of Human Sciences

Thought I’d share some recent publicity that CASTLE and I have gotten. I’ve been sitting on some of these for a while and wanted to get them all out so I can focus on NECC ‘09!

Edutopia

Quick: Name ten excellent Web sites related to the grade level or subject area you teach.

Scott McLeod, coordinator of the educational-administration program at Iowa State University, recently posed that question on his blog, Dangerously Irrelevant. Many of the comments his readers left echo McLeod's assertion that the Internet delivers "a paucity of high-quality online resources for educators."

McLeod and others don't deny the abundance of online resources teachers have at their fingertips. The challenge is sifting through all that stuff to find what you need -- and then knowing how to incorporate the gems into your curriculum. 

Read more…

T.H.E. Journal

SCOTT MCLEOD SAYS the great sin in the way professional development is provided in this country is one of omission. On his blog, McLeod, an associate professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at Iowa State University and the coordinator of the department's Educational Administration Program, writes, "Most of our school leaders have received no training whatsoever when it comes to 21st-century schooling."

It is not totally their fault, he says. Few higher ed programs for administrators even have a course dealing with digital technology, and if they do, the course generally covers basic software, not leadership. Neither school districts nor professional organizations offer workshops in the area either. As a result, no movement can be made toward 21stlearning environments: When leaders are clueless about technology and the impact it can have in classrooms, they are powerless to change their school or district into one that provides tech-enabled instruction for students.

Read more…

Fort Dodge (IA) Messenger (this link might expire?)

In a world where so much revolves around technology, high school students often only have the opportunity to use technology as part of their in-school learning process for an average of 30 minutes per week.

That is something that Scott McLeod, associate professor of educational leadership at Iowa State University, would like to see change in Iowa classrooms.

McLeod was the keynote speaker Tuesday afternoon at the Iowa Central Summer Science Institute at Iowa Central Community College, where he addressed a group of 25 high school and college science instructors on how they can implement technology in the classroom and why it is so crucial for students to be able to develop workplace skills and remain engaged in their course work.

Read more…

ISU Talk About IT

See the original here…

ISU College of Human Sciences

See the original here… (pp. 18-19)

Happy reading / viewing!

Technology boot camp for administrators

A few weeks ago we decided to offer a technology ‘boot camp’ for administrators. CASTLE is working with the School Administrators of Iowa to make it happen. For those of you who are interested, here is some information on what we’re doing:

• Promotional flyer
• Boot camp wiki 
• The signs we have all around the room

We started yesterday. Unlike our Transitioning Schools into the 21st Century workshops, which focused on technology leadership issues, the purpose of the boot camp is solely to ramp up school leaders’ technological skills. Our emphasis is on providing a safe space for administrators to learn and empowering them to walk away from the workshop with the ability to actually do this stuff. We’re taking our time, answering lots of questions, and covering whatever we can in the time that we have. We had participants blogging within the first hour yesterday. They were pretty excited!

We’ve got a great bunch of school leaders in this first boot camp. If today goes as well as yesterday, we’ll do a few more next academic year.

Any feedback that you have on what we’re doing would be most welcome. Anyone out there doing something similar? If so, how’s it going?

2009 Game Education Summit begins today!

The 2009 Game Education Summit begins today in Pittsburgh. If you’re not attending, the keynote presentations will be streamed live and also will be available afterward. The summit looks awesome; it’s “the only conference where the video game industry and academics from around the world can come together to have meaningful conversations about the future of game development.”

Wish I could be there! Maybe someone’s liveblogging or there’s a Twitter hashtag for the event?

CASTLE Summer Book Club - We have liftoff!

Whew! It’s consumed a lot of my time the past week but I am pleased to say that the 2009 CASTLE Summer Book Club is off and running! [Okay, more accurately, I should say that it has consumed a lot of the valuable time of Laura Bestler, CASTLE’s technology coordinator. Thank you, Laura!]

How to participate

Thanks to a few last-minute folks, our grand total is 246. Participants are busy introducing themselves (and learning how to comment on a blog!). If you want to follow the action, here are our four discussion groups:

• Group 1 (blue)
• Group 2 (orange)
• Group 3 (green)
• Group 4 (pink)

Even if you’re not an ‘official’ participant and thus can’t post to the group blogs, you still can play along at home by leaving comments (be sure to read the copyright notice in the initial Getting Started post). If you’re interested, each discussion group also has RSS feeds and e-mail subscription options for both the posts and the comments.

Social media

The book club has a Twitter and Technorati hashtag (#castlebc) and a Twibe.

Hope you’ll join us for our live podcast with Dr. Daniel Willingham, the author of Why Don’t Students Like School?, at 12pm Central on July 13!

CASTLE Summer Book Club - Update 3

[Update: If you registered, please check your junk mail / spam folders. Many of you who thought you had not received an e-mail from me later found my message in there...]

Registration for the 2009 CASTLE Summer Book Club has closed. We have 238 participants this year, including myself. Whew! Participants come from the following countries:

• Canada (6)
• Malaysia (1)
• Singapore (1)
• United Kingdom (1)
• United States (229)

I have divided us into four discussion groups. Last night I sent an e-mail to all participants that confirmed their registration and notified them of their group number. They will receive another e-mail this weekend that includes the URL of their online discussion area. The links to the four discussion areas will be posted here as well. Our conversations will be public and anyone can join us on an ad hoc basis as desired.

We start on Monday!

Mark your calendars

Dr. Daniel Willingham, author of the book that we’re reading, Why Don’t Students Like School?, has graciously agreed to do a live podcast with me on July 13 from 1pm to 2pm Eastern. Questions will be generated from our book club participants.

Related posts

• Our discussion timeline for the summer
• Some FAQs
• Another update

CASTLE Summer Book Club - Update 2

Registration for the 2009 CASTLE Summer Book Club closes this Wednesday at midnight. To date we have 159 participants, which blows the doors off of last year’s total of 125. A week ago we had 81 participants, so we’ve effectively doubled the size of the group in the last seven days. Awesome!

We’re reading Why Don’t Students Like School? by Dr. Daniel Willingham, a cognitive psychologist at the University of Virginia. I selected this book despite the fact that my alma mater, The College of William & Mary, is a fierce in-state academic rival of UVA so you know the book has to be pretty good! Sorry, those of you who have asked for a Kindle version...

Stay in touch as you have questions. I’ll see some of you online starting next week! 

CASTLE Summer Book Club - Update 1

We’re down to two weeks before the 2009 CASTLE Summer Book Club starts and we’ve got 81 participants signed up already. That’s great!

We will be reading Why Don't Students Like School? by Dr. Daniel Willingham. I'm still deciding what online platform we’re going to use to facilitate our discussions. Last year we used Lefora. It worked pretty well but so far I’m leaning toward something different this year.

Here are some answers to a few questions that people have asked me:

1. Will our conversations occur on specific dates or at specific times? No, our discussion will be completely asynchronous. We don’t care when you participate. Whatever’s most convenient for you.
2. What are the expectations regarding participation? We ask that you don’t sign up if you’re not committed to being fully engaged in the entire 5 weeks of discussion. That means that you’re keeping up with the reading (no more than 40 pages each week), visiting our discussion space at least several times a week, and participating rather than lurking.
3. What happens if I change my mind or need to drop out? Well, this is all self-organized and voluntary so there’s not much we can do about it. We lost participants last year because they didn’t like the book, their summer schedule changed, they couldn’t get into the online discussion format, etc. No worries. It’s your life! That said, we hope most of you will make it to the end (it’s only 5 weeks!).
4. Should I participate if I’m not a K-12 educator? Maybe. We’re surely not going to kick you out and probably will benefit from your different perspective. It depends on how much you’re interested in how people learn and what that means for cognitively-appropriate teaching practice in K-12 classrooms.
5. Will our discussions be private? Nope. So be thoughtful as you write, particularly if you’re discussing people you know or the organization in which you work.
6. What’s our reading schedule again? You can find that and other information (including how to sign up!) at my original post announcing the book club.

Got other questions that aren’t answered here? Leave a comment below or drop me a note; I’ll do my best to answer them quickly.

Second annual CASTLE summer book club starts June 15

After much deliberation, I’ve decided to do another online summer book club. I’m supposed to be taking the summer off but last year’s discussion of Influencer: The Power to Change Anything was so much fun that I can’t resist doing it again…

This year’s reading for the CASTLE summer book club will be Why Don’t Students Like School? A Cognitive Scientist Answers Questions About How the Mind Works and What It Means for Your Classroom. The author is Dr. Daniel Willingham, Professor of Psychology at The University of Virginia.

Getting started

1. Complete the online participation form by midnight, June 10 (Central time).
2. Buy the book!

Commitments

• We start June 15. Be ready.
• Keep up with the reading. No excuses.
• Be an active participant in our online discussion area.
• Dissect ideas vigorously but also be nice to other discussants.
• Help foster interesting dialogue and connected community.

Schedule

1. 6/15 to 6/21 – Introduction, Chapter 1, and Chapter 2 (40 pages)
2. 6/22 to 6/28 – Chapters 3 and 4 (40 pages)
3. 6/29 to 7/5 – Chapters 5 and 6 (32 pages)
4. 7/6 to 7/12 – Chapters 7 and 8 (34 pages)
5. 7/13 to 7/19 – Chapter 9, Conclusion, and Wrap-Up (20 pages)

This offer is open to all leaders and change agents, at whatever level they’re operating (hint: this might be a good summer activity for some of your local principals or superintendents!).

I’m looking forward to some interesting discussions. Hope some of you will join me this summer!

Related posts

• CASTLE Summer Book Club - Update 1

Dangerously Irrelevant now available for the Kindle

Thanks to instructions from the kind folks at Mashable, this blog is now available in a Kindle edition. I think you now have at least four different ways to connect with Dangerously Irrelevant: going to the web site, RSS, e-mail, and Kindle. Just trying to create a variety of options for you…

Happy reading!

Constructing Modern Knowledge '09

Hmmm, let’s see…

A learning institute in Manchester, New Hampshire in July. Well, Manchester routinely appears on lists of best places to live. It’s in New England, which will be all green and lovely that time of year. AWESOME.

And the conference is hosted by Dr. Gary Stager, so I know it will be thought-provoking and brain-stimulating. DOUBLY AWESOME.

And the featured faculty will include Deborah Meier, Herb Kohl, Sylvia Martinez, John Stetson, and others. And attendees get a free copy of Kohl’s new book if they sign up by June 5. And there will be an evening reception at the famed FableVision Studios as well as a night out in Boston. TRIPLY, QUADRUPLY, and QUINTUPLY AWESOME.

Yep, sounds like a winner to me!

4 Guys Talking - Episode 6 (Chuck Heinlein)

If you’d like to know what a good statewide 21st century school leadership development program looks like, have we got a podcast for you!

This morning we had Episode 6 of 4 Guys Talking, the ‘talk radio’ podcast series from CASTLE. We spent the first 40 minutes talking with Chuck Heinlein, Director of the Leadership Center for 21st Century Schools at the West Virginia Department of Education.

I think this was one of our best podcasts to date. Chuck shared a wealth of information about the statewide principal institutes that he’s running, and we learned a ton about the legislative supports, Department of Education commitments, funding and policy mechanisms, and other supports that are in place in the state. I have the sense that West Virginia really is trying very hard to move its schools (and its school leaders) forward in a thoughtful, progressive, sustainable manner.

You can download the podcast or listen to a Web-streamed version here:

• www.blogtalkradio.com/uceacastle

You also can subscribe to the 4 Guys Talking feed using iTunes or a RSS reader.

Thanks to those of you who joined us live. I’m not sure when our next episodes will be but I will blog about them when I know. Happy listening!

Update: I deleted the embedded BlogTalkRadio player that used to be in this post. Since it started playing automatically, I thought it was too annoying!

4 Guys Talking - May 26 guest, Chuck Heinlein

Chuck Heinlein, Director of the Leadership Center for 21st Century Schools at the West Virginia Department of Education, will be our guest tomorrow on the 4 Guys Talking podcast. Chuck has an incredible job. Over the past few years he has run hundreds of administrators in his state through year-long institutes on 21st century schooling. As far as I can tell, West Virginia is far ahead of other states when it comes to investing in a statewide model for 21st century leadership development.

You can join us and Chuck on May 26, 1pm Central, for the live podcast. Feel free to call in and join the conversation yourself and/or help us brainstorm some questions for Chuck beforehand. The podcast also will be available for download afterward. Thanks!

What if you could find every school, district, or university Twitter feed in one place?

Continuing the theme of my last post, how great would it be if every school, district, or university Twitter feed was in one place? The aggregated posts would give us a sense of what each level of schooling thought was worth publicizing. I’m guessing that we’d also discover lots of interesting information that is typicallly hidden from the view of most of us…

Schools Twibe:

Districts Twibe:

Universities Twibe:

What if every Iowa educator on Twitter could find each other?

After a recent presentation here in Iowa that included some discussion of Twitter, a superintendent came up to me and said, “Okay, I’m in. But how will I find people that I want to follow?” That fantastic question led me to create the Iowa Administrators group at Twibes:

While I was at it, I also created the Iowa Teachers group at Twibes:

Shari Barnhart, Technology Coordinator for the Oskaloosa Schools, then created the Iowa Technology Coordinators group at Twibes:

So what we have here is a burgeoning effort to create spaces where Iowa educators can find others in the state who are on Twitter, see what they’re saying, and sign up to follow them. Maybe there’s a better way to do this but for now I think this has some promise, particularly if folks are willing to sign up and pass this along to others. I believe there are some great conversation and resource-sharing possibilities if most of the Iowa educators on Twitter are following each other.

Badge ribbons for NECC 2009

I’m getting excited for NECC 2009. Just a few more weeks and I’ll be griping about the hot, muggy weather in my hometown of Washington, D.C. I can’t wait!

Those of you who attended Edubloggercon last year may remember that I brought a bunch of buttons for attendees. This year, after consulting with Steve Hargadon and Anita McAnear at ISTE, I decided to spend some CASTLE funds to purchase name badge ribbons. You can see mockups below. The white one will be left-justified, not centered, and I’ll bring Sharpies so that folks can write in their Twitter name. The green and white ribbons will be available at Edubloggercon. Whatever’s left over will be put with the blue ribbons in the NECC Unplugged lounge. First come, first serve. Hope to see you there!

Model 21st century schools - Update 2

Here’s how we’re doing at collectively creating a list of model 21st century schools that are doing a nice job of infusing 21st century skills, digital technologies, problem- or inquiry-based learning, and other innovative practices into their school organization:

Those 59 United States schools represent 26 states. The International schools are in 10 different countries.

So we’re making GREAT progress. However, we still have a number of states (and countries) that don’t have a single school organization listed. I know that there are schools in every state that are doing wonderful things in the areas of problem-based learning, 21st century skills, or technology integration. Would you help us identify more model schools, either by adding them yourself or passing this quest along to others? We are in desperate need of good models that educators can learn from and visit. Thanks!

Blog Tweet Cook - Update 1

A couple of weeks ago I launched an edublogger/eduTwitterer cookbook, BlogTweetCook.org. At the time, I said I didn’t know if it was a great idea or a dumb one. Well, to date we have 22 recipes posted, ranging from Señor Chris’ Cheesy Chicken Enchiladas to Hot German Potato Salad to Brew’s Brandy Slush to Roasted Halibut with Banana-Orange Relish.

Try some of these out. Pass along the URL. And if you’ve got a great recipe to share, please do so!

Upcoming event: AASA's Seattle Summit

I was delighted to see the announcement from the American Association of School Administrators (AASA) that it is hosting a summit in July on technology leadership issues. AASA is the national organization for school superintendents. Despite the desperate need for more tech-, 21st-century-skills–, and/or future-savvy school administrators, we don’t see near enough learning opportunities in this area from the big three national associations (AASA, NAESP, and NASSP). Maybe down the road AASA will do another one of these and I’ll get an invite to participate (hint, hint)!

The three-day institute is called the Seattle Summit. If any of you go, let me know how it went for you! Anyone want to go and live blog it? That would be fun!

4 Guys Talking - Episode 5 (Lane Mills)

This morning we had Episode 5 of 4 Guys Talking, the new ‘talk radio’ podcast series from CASTLE. We spent almost the entire time talking about university educational leadership preparation programs.

Our first 40 minutes was spent with Dr. Lane Mills, Associate Professor at East Carolina University (ECU) and board member for the journal,Innovate. Among other things, Lane talked about being the ‘lone wolf’ faculty member when it came to trying to prepare his program’s graduates (future school administrators) for the demands of the digital, global age. Lane essentially said that

Making change in higher education is like pushing a rope.

We continued to talk about the difficulty of getting our faculty peers on board ideologically and, even when they are, also getting them the training and knowledge that they need but currently lack. There’s little support for faculty even when they do want to move in this direction.

After Lane left us, we continued to talk about the struggles that educational leadership programs face as they work to prepare appropriately-empowered graduates. One issue that we started to discuss - and probably should spend some more time on in a later podcast – is the desirability of having certain technology and/or leadership expectations for admission of our incoming students (who are typically teachers or principals) and/or explicitly-stated desired outcomes for our graduates regarding technology leadership.

Jen Hegna challenged us right at the end, stating:

What can k-12 schools do while higher ed is trying to figure [out] their leadership programs? It is hard for us to wait...we need change now!

She’s got us dead to rights, I’m afraid. Other than for her to keep plugging away on her end, I don’t have any great answers right now for her concern. It’s going to take a while for those of us in academe to get our act together (if ever we will).

You can download the podcast or listen to a Web-streamed version here:

• www.blogtalkradio.com/uceacastle

You also can subscribe to the 4 Guys Talking feed using iTunes or a RSS reader.

Thanks to those of you who joined us live. Our next show will be on May 26, 1pm to 2pm Central. We’ll be talking with Dr. Chuck Heinlein, Director of the West Virginia Institute for 21st Century Leadership, which is sponsored by the West Virginia Department of Education.

[I'm still reworking CASTLE Conversations, the old CASTLE podcast channel, which will include all previous and podcasts (including 4 Guys Talking). I'll post about it when it's ready (probably not until later this summer).]

Happy listening!

An amazing lineup of Classroom 2.0 events

Steve Hargadon over at Classroom 2.0 has an amazing set of webinars lined up for us this week. Here’s the relevant portion of Steve’s recent e-mail message:

Tuesday, May 5th, at 12:30pm Pacific / 3:30pm Eastern [/ 7:30pm GMT]:  Keith Krueger, the CEO of the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN.org), discusses the Education Stimulus package and reviews the results of school CTO and superintendent survey.  Keith takes a holistic view of the costs of technology, discusses proactive strategic and tactical approaches to minimize the damage from reduced technology investments, and explores how technology can be used to save time and money.  Part of the http://www.EdStimulus.org project, join the event at https://sas.elluminate.com/m.jnlp?password=M.58F396AF09B4D1D0DEC23158F489CB

Wednesday, May 6th, at 5:00pm Pacific / 8:00pm Eastern / 12am GMT:  Don Tapscott, the author or co-author of 13 widely read books, including Wikinomics, discusses with me the future of education, Grown Up Digital (his latest book), and the Net Gen Education Project.  Log-in and other details at http://www.futureofeducation.com/forum/topics/don-tapscott-talks-about

Thursday, May 7th, at 5:00pm Pacific / 8:00pm Eastern / 12am GMT:  Michael Horn, co-author of Disrupting Class:  How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns, and the co-founder and Executive Director (Education) of Innosight Institute, a non-profit think tank devoted to applying the theories of disruptive innovation to problems in the social sector.  We'll discuss his book, Web 2.0, and more.  Login and other details at http://www.futureofeducation.com/forum/topics/michael-horn-disrupting-class

I don’t know how you get all of this great stuff arranged for us, Steve, but THANK YOU! I think I can make the first two and would do the third one too if my son didn’t have baseball practice. I’ll have to catch it on replay. Hope to see some of you participate in at least one of these!

Edubloggers and eduTwitterers, share your recipes at Blog Tweet Cook!

Okay, I don’t know if this is a great idea or a dumb one but I thought I’d roll it out and see (the Twittersphere seemed to like it a few days ago)…

I am pleased to announce the formation of BlogTweetCook.org, an online edublogger/eduTwitterer cookbook. Are you an educator who blogs or tweets? Do you also have a great recipe to share? If so, head on over to Blog Tweet Cook and add your delicious contribution(s)!

As always, suggestions and feedback are welcome!

[Hat tip to an earlier, unpublicized idea by Jennifer Jones, John Pederson (Pot Roast Nachos!), and Cindy Seibel.]

Model 21st century schools - Update 1

A week ago I asked for your help identifying model 21st century schools. Although I knew of a few schools or districts that were good models of what the new learning paradigm might look like, I was sure that there were many more schools out there that were doing great things when it came to project- or inquiry-based learning, technology integration, and so on.

Here’s what we have so far:

• 36 schools/districts in the USA, representing only 18 states
• 6 international schools, representing 5 countries

So, as you can see, we have a long way to go toward meeting my goal of at least 2 schools in each state and at least 50 in other countries.

Why don’t we have more? Several reasons, I’m guessing:

1. My readers don’t know what the exemplary 21st century schools are in their state/country,
2. I wasn’t persuasive enough for my readers to actually go to the Moving Forward wiki and enter the schools that they know about, and/or
3. There just aren’t that many exemplary 21st century schools.

While #3 is probably true to a certain extent, I’m guessing (hoping?) that each state has at least 2 schools that can serve as models for others. And I’m positive that some states, like California or Texas, have many more than 2. So I’m asking for your help again. Please go to the United States or International wiki pages and enter schools in your state/country that you know about. Also pass this quest along to others who may have knowledge in this area. We’re in desperate need of models of 21st century schooling. Help me create a shared resource that will be of value to everyone?

4 Guys Talking - May 11 guest, Dr. Lane Mills

Dr. Lane Mills, Associate Professor at East Carolina University (ECU) and board member for the journal, Innovate, will be our next guest on the 4 Guys Talking podcast. Lane's working hard to integrate digital technologies into the Educational Leadership program at ECU. He also does a great deal of technology-facilitated data-driven decision-making work with school districts.

You can join Lane and us on May 11, 9am Central, for the live podcast. Feel free to call in and join the conversation yourself and/or help us brainstorm some questions for Lane beforehand. The podcast also will be available for download afterward. Thanks!

4 Guys Talking - Episode 4 (Jeff Mao)

Yesterday was Episode 4 of 4 Guys Talking, the new ‘talk radio’ podcast series from CASTLE. We spent the entire time talking about 1:1 laptop programs. Our first 50 minutes was spent with Jeff Mao, Learning Technology Policy Director for the State of Maine. Among other things, Jeff talked about funding models, professional development for teachers and administrators, pedagogical frameworks, challenges faced by the state over the past few years, and, perhaps surprisingly, the relative lack of emphasis on standardized test scores as measurable outcomes for the initiative. He also shared his strong feelings about laptops v. netbooks for 1:1 programs. After Jeff left us, we spent the last 10 minutes debriefing, sharing thoughts, and raising further questions.

You can download the podcast or listen to a Web-streamed version here:

• www.blogtalkradio.com/uceacastle

You also can subscribe to the 4 Guys Talking feed using iTunes or a RSS reader.

Thanks to those of you who joined us live yesterday, either by calling in or listening over the Web. Future dates/times are as follows (all times Central):

• May 11, 9am to 10am
• May 26, 1pm to 2pm

[Yes, I'm still reworking CASTLE Conversations, the old CASTLE podcast channel, which will include all previous and podcasts (including 4 Guys Talking). I'll post about it when it's ready (probably not until summer).]

Happy listening!

Photo credit: An Apple in the dark 2

Help wanted: Model 21st century schools?

Which schools are good models that others could (should) visit to see what a new educational paradigm might look like?

This is the #1 question I get asked when I work with K-12 educators. I know a few, but I’m guessing that you know more. So I’m on a quest…

1. Think about who's doing a nice job in your state/country of infusing 21st century skills, digital technologies, problem- or inquiry-based learning, and other innovative practices into their school organization.
2. Go to the United States and/or International page at CASTLE’s Moving Forward wiki and add the name of the school organization and contact person in the appropriate place. If your state/territory/country isn’t listed, please add it.
3. Using the category list at the top of the page, indicate the category of innovation at the end of your entry so that visitors know which schools to visit for what. If you need to add a category, please do so.
4. Hyperlink the name of the school organization to its web site.
5. Repeat Steps 2 through 4 for each school organization that is a model of 21st century learning.

By Monday, April 27, I’m hoping that together we can identify at least 150 model school organizations, including at least 2 in every state and at least 50 overseas. I will be reporting out daily on our progress both here and via Twitter.

Please pass along this quest. The more model 21st century schools we get, the better resources these two pages will be for everyone. Feel free to use the logo as desired. Thank you!

Paul Potts, Susan Boyle, and the problem of undiscovered talent in schools

I’ve probably watched this video clip of Paul Potts a dozen times and I still choke up when I see it [click on picture to see video]:

Now Britain has Susan Boyle:

There’s a lot of undiscovered potential out there. As schools and societies, we often fail to create the conditions in which talent can be nurtured, recognized, and utilized. I hope that one of the lasting impacts of this Internet age will be that people’s skills and talents get noticed and used more effectively. Sure, there still will be a lot of junk that will get in the way of this happening. But the potential for ordinary citizens to express their talents and reach others is greater than it ever has been before.

Do you have a story of undiscovered talent in your local school organization? I bet you do…

4 Guys Talking - Jeff Mao (Maine 1:1 laptop initiative) joins us on Monday!

I’m pleased to announce that Jeff Mao, Learning Technology Policy Director for the State of Maine, will be our first-ever official guest at 4 Guys Talking. Jeff will be joining us on Monday, April 20, at 2:00pm Central to share the latest on Maine’s statewide 1:1 laptop initiative, including its recent push to expand the program to include all students in grades 7 through 12.

We have started brainstorming some questions for Jeff on our wiki page. Feel free to add yours! You also may wish to first listen to Jeff’s conversation with the EdTechTalk crew back in June 2007. Hope you’ll join us on Monday!

Photo credit: An Apple in the dark 2

4 Guys Talking - Episode 3

This is a long overdue post that Episode 3 of 4 Guys Talking, the new ‘talk radio’ podcast series from CASTLE, is now available. As usual, our conversation ranged a bit but our focus was on reinventing schools. Justin Bathon said that we may have been a little negative. You’ll have to listen to see if you concur.

FYI, you’ll see that we had some hosting glitches at the beginning. If you start at 5:45 into the podcast, you’ll skip all of our confusion!

You can download the podcast or listen to a Web-streamed version here:

• www.blogtalkradio.com/uceacastle

You also can subscribe to the 4 Guys Talking feed using iTunes or a RSS reader.

Thanks to those of you who joined us live, either by calling in or listening over the Web. Future dates/times are as follows (all times Central):

• April 20, 2pm to 3pm
• May 11, 9am to 10am
• May 26, 1pm to 2pm

My hopes to rework CASTLE Conversations, the old CASTLE podcast channel (which will include all previous and podcasts such as 4 Guys Talking), are on hold until the end of my semester. I'll post about it when it's ready.

Happy listening!

What would you ask university students about technology in their learning?

Tomorrow is Iowa State University’s first-ever symposium for the new ComETS group here on campus. Modeled after a similar group at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, ComETS is an attempt to bring together all of the folks at the university who care about technology integration into one place. George Siemens from the University of Manitoba is our headliner; he’s doing a morning workshop and an afternoon keynote for us. Other events on the schedule include affinity group meetings and ‘lightning strike’ sessions on interesting technologies.

To conclude the symposium, I’m moderating a panel of students that will be discussing how they think about technology in their personal and academic lives. I’ve set up a wiki page where we’re generating questions for the students. If you’d like to add a question, please do!

I’ll probably be live-blogging George’s keynote and/or workshop tomorrow. Stay tuned at my Twitter feed for more details…

Academics on Twitter

Recently I was interviewed for The Chronicle of Higher Education’s article on academics who Twitter. Here’s my portion of the story:

8. Scott McLeod, an associate professor at Iowa State University and director of the university's Center for the Advanced Study of Technology Leadership in Education. Tweet: "College students are online more AND reading more? http://snipurl.com/eko4k"

http://twitter.com/mcleod
Followers: 1,307. Posts: 1,190.

Mr. McLeod argues that professors have been too slow to adopt Twitter. Academic discussions online often take place on closed e-mail lists, he says, when they should be happening in public forums like Twitter, so that a diverse group of outsiders can join in. "I think academics are actually missing a lot by not being involved in more of these social tools," he told me. "There are a lot of academics who think, 'If it's not coming from some other academic it's not worth a damn,' and that's not right."

He admits that some of the messages on Twitter are banal, such as people describing what they had for lunch that day, but he said such notes are part of what makes Twitter such a powerful way to feel connected to far-flung colleagues. "It's like those daily interactions you have with your neighbor — sometimes they're highbrow and sometimes they're lowbrow, but after a while you really get to know the person."

I don’t know if academics have been too slow to adopt Twitter specifically, but I definitely believe that academics have been too slow to adopt social media generally.

Check out the article if you’re interested. What do you think are some good ways that professors could be using Twitter?

4 Guys Talking - Episode 3 is today

FYI, Episode 3 of 4 Guys Talking is today at noon Central. Follow the link to the live Internet stream, which also includes the call-in number if you want to give us a ring!

The President is calling

The President is calling:

I'm calling on our nation's governors and state education chiefs to develop standards and assessments that don't simply measure whether students can fill in a bubble on a test, but whether they possess 21st century skills like problem-solving and critical thinking and entrepreneurship and creativity.

President Barack Obama, March 10, 2009

Alia iacta est. How will we answer the call?

4 Guys Talking - Episode 2

Yesterday was Episode 2 of 4 Guys Talking, the new ‘talk radio’ podcast series from CASTLE. Like last time, our conversation ranged widely. Among other things, we discussed whether or not university educational administration programs should bear some blame for the poor leadership that exists in many schools, the fact that most school district technology leaders have had little to no leadership training, the unfortunate and continuing marginalization of technology to its own ‘silo’ within school organizations, and efforts within our respective states to train school administrators to be better technology leaders.

You can download the podcast or listen to a Web-streamed version here:

• www.blogtalkradio.com/uceacastle

You also can subscribe to the 4 Guys Talking feed using iTunes or a RSS reader.

Thanks to those of you who joined us live yesterday, either by calling in or listening over the Web. Future dates/times are as follows (all times Central):

• April 1, 12pm to 1pm
• April 20, 2pm to 3pm
• May 11, 9am to 10am
• May 26, 1pm to 2pm

I'm still reworking CASTLE Conversations, the old CASTLE podcast channel, which will include all previous and podcasts (including 4 Guys Talking). I'll post about it when it's ready.

Happy listening!

BlogBall09 - Our leagues are ready!

For those of you who are interested, here are the 24 teams that are participating in edublogger fantasy baseball this year (in alphabetical order by manager).

League A

• Swing from the Heels, Eric Bouvier, Auburn Public Schools Ed. Tech Blog
• Mr. Mojo Risin’, Jeremy Brueck, Raised Digital
• Motor City Kitties, Jim Dornberg, EdTech Update
• Rutherford’s Beard, Bill Ferriter, The Tempered Radical
• Buckeye Ballers, Toby Fischer, Future of Education
• RickRockRadio, Rick Heitmeyer, The Hump in the Bus
• Higgy’s Tribe Time, Chris Higgins, Mr. Higgins’ Blog
• Oslo Octopi, Scott McLeod, Dangerously Irrelevant
• My Momma’s a Sox Fan, Brendan Murphy, Philosophy Without a Home
• Hirschy Bears, Robert Pondiscio, The Core Knowledge Blog
• Broke a bat Mountain, Mark Schuldt, Roosevelt Elementary
• ChiSox, Dave Sherman, The Principal and Interest

League B

• A Few Good Men, Jon Becker, Educational Insanity
• TAG! You’re Out!, Russ Goerend, TAGmirror
• Kneighborhood Knine, Mark Granito, The Kneighborhood Annex
• Unsigned Free Agent, Matt Haan, Hoover Power Podcast
• Lehmann’s Demons, Chris Lehmann, Practical Theory
• Lou’s Sport Shop, Dave Meister, PHSprincipalBLOG
• Carolina Seadogs, Jason Ramsden, Raventech Reveals
• Kerplunk, Ted Sakshaug, Nonsense
• Harold’s Red Sox, Harold Shaw, Aging Reluctantly
• Great Hambinos, Brian Smith, Streaming Thoughts
• PrincipalsPage, Michael Smith, PrincipalsPage.com Blog
• BewareOfGreenWeenies, Vinnie Vrotny, Multi-faceted Refractions

My sincerest apologies to those of you who also expressed interest but e-mailed me after these folks. We didn’t have enough to make a third league or I would have done so. Maybe next year!

Good luck, everyone (and Go Twins!).

4 Guys Talking - Episode 2 is today

FYI, Episode 2 of 4 Guys Talking is today at 2pm Central. Follow the link to the live Internet stream, which also includes the call-in number if you want to give us a ring!

The Iowa series - Wrap-up

I've had a lot of fun guest blogging over at The Des Moines Register this week. For those of you who would like to have a single link that you can forward to others, you can use this web address:

http://snipurl.com/iowaseries

Here are links to each of the five posts here at Dangerously Irrelevant:

• Iowa - 21st century curricula
• Iowa - A robust system of online learning
• Iowa - A computer in every hand
• Iowa - Invest in leadership
• Iowa - Better information

Happy reading!

Read Kindle books without a Kindle

I was really excited to read David Pogue’s article today on Amazon’s new Kindle for iPhone application that allows you to download e-books from Amazon onto your iPhone or iPod Touch. That’s right – no need to buy a Kindle to access Amazon’s ever-increasing book selection. I was quoted today in the Des Moines Register as saying that in many ways the iPhone represents the future of mobile computing. Sure, there’s still a place for the larger screens and keyboards of laptops and netbooks, but it’s awfully handy to have a device in your pocket that does so much.

I’m off to the Apple app store! Wouldn’t it be really great if Amazon made its source code public so that others could improve upon its free app (and thus result in Amazon selling more books)?

At $10 a book (or maybe a little more for textbooks), I think this opens up a lot of possiblities for K-12 classrooms. What do you think?

Photo credit: And a good book

Iowa - 21st century curricula

[This is Post 1 for my guest blogging stint at The Des Moines Register.]

Archimedes said “Give me a lever long enough and I can move the world.” This week I will be blogging about 5 key levers that I think are necessary to move Iowa schools forward and help our graduates survive and thrive in this new digital, global age in which we now live. Today I am going to emphasize the work that is being done by the Iowa Department of Education and others regarding 21st century curricula.

Those of you who regularly follow Linda Fandel’s two blogs here at The Des Moines Register know that last year Iowa became the seventh state to join the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, an initiative designed to “position 21st century skills at the center of US K-12 education by building collaborative partnerships among education, business, community and government leaders.” These so-called 21st century skills are those needed by Iowa graduates to be competitive in a global information economy:

Why are these skills so important? Because the rise of digital information and communication technologies such as e-mail, instant messaging, videoconferencing, and the Internet have virtually eliminated the workplace barriers of geography and time. It is now about as easy to work with people halfway across the globe as it is with folks halfway across town. As a result, information, money, and ideas criss-cross the globe at dizzying speeds and work moves to the location of lowest cost or greatest expertise. This puts an extraordinary amount of pressure on the Western wage premium: why pay an American worker such a high salary when someone in another country will do the same work for less?

So we have company after company, task force after task force, and commission after commission telling us that the skills listed above are important because they’re the ones that enable American workers and companies to differentiate themselves from others across the globe. They’re the skills that justify higher American wages and benefits. They’re the skills that drive American creativity and innovation. Economists have shown quite clearly that the only growth in the American workforce is occurring in “creative class” professions that involve critical thinking, complex communication, collaborative problem-solving, and other more-abstract skills:

If you turn that second line chart into a stacked bar chart, it looks like this:

If we look at just the two ends of this last chart, we see the fundamental dilemma. Our K-12 schools, which were created for an era when 3/4 of American workers were involved in agricultural or manual labor jobs, are now expected to function in an environment in which about 3/4 of our workers are now in more cognitively complex service or creative professions:

But we hear from American corporations that they’re having great difficulty finding workers who possess the skills needed to do these jobs, which is why they’re either hiring people from other countries or taking jobs overseas.

If Americans wish to retain their economic preeminence, our schools have to change. The rest of the world is catching up to us and creative, innovative, problem-solving (which requires deep conceptual, rather than shallow procedural, understanding) is American students’ weakest area on international assessments. If Iowa workers are to be globally competitive, they will need schools to help them acquire a different set of skills than they have needed in the past.

Is the Iowa education system up to the challenge? Only time will tell. But a critical step to making this transition is the creation of curricula that emphasize student acquisition of 21st century skills rather than regurgitation of discrete facts and low-level procedural knowledge. This will be an extremely difficult change for Iowa schools to make. We all have mental models, primarily informed by our own school experiences, of what school should look and be like. We cannot hang on to those models and expect our graduates to be successful in a vastly different economic climate. We cannot simply sprinkle 21st century skills like fairy dust on top of what we’re already doing. Instead, we must fundamentally realign the curricula and instruction that occurs within our schools in order to produce the workers and citizens that we need.

The Iowa Core Curriculum, particularly the aspects related to 21st century skills, is intended to get us where we need to go. Iowa citizens need to educate themselves about the Core and start asking tough questions about vision, development, implementation, funding, training, and support of their legislators, local school board members, and the Department of Education. Inaction is not an option, nor is tweaking the status quo, as both are losing strategies in a rapidly-changing digital, global economy.

Recommended reading

• The Global Achievement Gap, Tony Wagner
• Partnership for 21st Century Skills publications

Recommended viewing 

Scott McLeod, J.D., Ph.D., is an Associate Professor and coordinator of the Educational Administration program at Iowa State University. He also is Director of the UCEA Center for the Advanced Study of Technology Leadership in Education (CASTLE). He blogs regularly at www.dangerouslyirrelevant.org.

4 Guys Talking - Episode 1

Thursday was the inaugural episode of 4 Guys Talking, a new podcast series from CASTLE. The podcast consists of me, Jon Becker, David Quinn, and Jayson Richardson talking about a variety of education (K-12 and higher ed), technology, and/or leadership issues. We're all Educational Leadership professors who care about things like digital technologies, 21st century skills, and the like. Unfortunately, we're an extremely small minority in academia...

Thursday's conversation ranged widely. Among other things, we discussed whether undergraduates are truly the 'digital natives' that many say they are, universities' implementation of open source course management systems, how to facilitate K-12 teachers' buy-in toward technological initiatives, and who's to blame for the bad leadership that exists in many schools (a topic we'll likely return to in our next episode).

You can download the podcast or listen to a Web-streamed version here:

• www.blogtalkradio.com/uceacastle 

We do the podcast live on BlogTalkRadio, which essentially allows you to host (for free) an Internet version of live talk radio, so you can call in and participate if you wish. I think we can handle two or three callers at once besides the four of us (thanks to Jared and Lance who joined us for Episode 1!). Future dates/times are as follows (all times Central):

• March 9, 2pm to 3pm
• April 1, 12pm to 1pm 
• April 20, 2pm to 3pm 
• May 11, 9am to 10am 
• May 26, 1pm to 2pm 

FYI, I'm reworking CASTLE Conversations, the old CASTLE podcast channel. It will include all previous and podcasts (including 4 Guys Talking) so you'll be able to subscribe via RSS or iTunes. I'll post about it when it's ready.

Happy listening!

Video - My session with the Heartland AEA 11 superintendents

For your viewing pleasure this weekend, here’s my session with the Heartland AEA 11 (Iowa) superintendents. The video’s just over an hour long: about 25 minutes of my presentation followed by discussion (and a copy of Did You Know? 2.0). The video was filmed and edited by Dr. Gordon Dahlby, Director of Curriculum and Technology for the West Des Moines (IA) Community Schools (thanks, Gordon!). My presentation materials and other resources are available at the web page I made for the group. 

Want a media pass for the 2009 ASCD conference in Orlando?

The annual ASCD conference is in Orlando, Florida this year. ASCD is looking for some education bloggers who might be interested in live blogging the event. If you’re already attending the conference or are going to be in the area March 13 to 16, ASCD invites you to consider registering as a media representative.

As a member of the media, you will have free access to all sessions, including ticketed sessions. The ASCD communications team will be on site to help direct you to the most appropriate sessions, connect you with speakers and ASCD staff for interviews, and ‘attend to any request that may arise.’ The team also can connect you with educators with particular interests or expertise. Did I mention that there’s a staffed media room and free wireless access to allow you to freely write and blog from the convention center?

ASCD is one of my favorite educational organizations and also one of my favorite conferences. If you’re interested, contact me and I’ll put you in touch with the appropriate people. Thanks!