Being a "21st Century" teacher is still very much in vogue these days, and I still hear the term "21st Century Skills" tossed about from time to time at conferences and workshops. There’s nothing particularly wrong with the phrase (it’s immensely better than it’s predecessor "digital natives") as it speaks to the collaborative, creative, and communication skills that most educators should herald as the foundation of their instructional practice. "21st Century Skills" get a bad reputation though for being overly "techie", and quite often people will go out of their way to shoe horn every single piece of media creation they can into a document extolling teachers to adopt more tech. To be honest, that reputation is sometimes earned, as I see teachers that I work with struggle to try all sorts of new gadgets, tech, apps, and sites without getting too deeply into any of them, and only retaining some surface level knowledge, or worse yet, not even giving a tool or technique a fair shake. So when I saw Brad Currie tweet out the following image created by Sean Junkins, I had to poke a little bit of playful fun with it. And thus, my "21 Things Every 21st Century Teacher Should Do This year AND KEEP THEIR SANITY" was born! While I’m always applauding teachers and students to tackle new technology and learning through a hands-on, playful attitude, even I think that sometimes we do go a bit too far. So in response to Sean Junkin’s image, which was actually based on a blog post by Carl Hooker, I present my re-imagined task list for the "21st Century" teacher that wants to try new things, but stay sane in the process. Some of my suggestions are "tongue in cheek," but many I feel quite strongly about when it comes to creating something in the real world versus a digital creation. When I taught 6th grade science, my students and I had MUCH more fun building a grow station for a plant investigation, instead of just using a virtual interactive. We created experiences, developed relationships, and worked through a lot of "21st Century" skills while building something with our hands that then sat at a place of honor in our classroom for the rest of the year. Think of the list of things I’ve put together here as a means of blending much needed real-world experiences with some digital ones. Special thanks again to Brad Currie, Sean Junkins, and Carl Hooker for providing the impetus to create this. I hope it’s received as the playful riff that I intended it to be.    

We’ve made it to the long fabled episode 7 of our podcast! Actually, I have no idea whether that’s a milestone or not, but in this week’s episode I do get to use a creepy voice, Pete and I battle the evils of the Yik Yak App, and we touch upon the "no tech" philosophy of the Waldorf School. I also introduce a regular segment, "Stump Pete", in which we get to question whether he’s fit to call himself a musician. All that and more on this week’s exciting episode of "Tech Director Chat!" Timestamps for this week’s questions: :48 How’s it going today? :59 What’s up with this Yik Yak App that hit the district last week? 4:50 When the bond passes, will each new classroom have some type of interactive whiteboard and a sound system? 7:50 Does Ben sound too creepy when whispering into the microphone? 8:41 Do school districts send home manuals for devices that students use? 10:25 If we were to pursue a 1:1 program, how could you see the program being embodied in our school district? 12:15 Does anyone really want clones of Ben? 12:52 Is it vital for students to have access to technology? Why or why not? 17:00 The Waldorf School doesn’t believe in technology? 19:09 In the 1970s hit song, "The Night Chicago Died" where was "Daddy" a cop, and when? Tech Director Chat - Let’s Stump Pete!

Let’s get this out in the open; I am not your typical "techie". Yes, I enjoy some new shiny hardware and software, but I usually don’t find myself geeking out over every new gadget and website. I’m methodical, I’m analytical….I’m actually a bit of a curmudgeon from time to time. So when Joe Talavier asked what I think a "21st Century Classroom" looks like last week, I couldn’t help but steer this week’s "Tech Director Chat" conversation away from the technology. In fact, I’ve been cultivating a growing belief that the connections and reach technology affords us can lead us to dysfunction and alienation within our own local communities as often as they can help bridge divides on a global scale. Having said that, the rest of this week’s podcast is rather rosy, despite the poor audio quality (Skyping across the planet and recording flawless audio is a challenge). This week we follow Pete as he jets sets around to globe to Prague, where he is attending an Institute for Innovation in Education Gathering (iiE for short). We talk about potential changes to lighting, presentation technology, and other "wish list" items that teachers have regarding technology in their classroom, and touch briefly on why Pete doesn’t listen to a podcast that he participates in weekly! Pete and I both share their thoughts on the definition of "21st Century Classrooms" and I share my recent "21 Things Every 21st Century Teachers Should Do and Keep Their Sanity" based on Carl Hooker’s tech-heavy blog post of the same theme. And of course, listeners attempt to stump Pete, and almost come away with it in this episode! Oh, and a little bit of "humble bragging" as well! The "Tech Director Chat" podcast is currently featured as "New & Noteworthy" in iTunes for Educational Technology. Wahoo! Please go and subscribe or leave us some reviews to help make the show even better! Timestamps for this week’s questions: 1:17 What is Pete doing in Prague, and what is the iiE? 3:13 What is Pete’s role with the iiE? 4:50 A high school student helped plan an international conference? 6:20 When our bond passes, will there be money to change the lighting in the high school? 7:45 Will we be getting better projectors in the district? 8:40 Wait, Pete doesn’t listen to this podcast? 9:25 Is it possible that we might have new dimmer lighting or other enhanced lighting? 10:43 In 60 seconds or less, why does restarting your computer resolve a lot of problems? 12:05 What do you think a 21st Century classroom looks like? 17:18 Stump Pete! Who wrote the album, "Numbers?" 18:20 We were featured as a "New & Noteworthy" podcast in iTunes for Educational Technology, wahoo! Tech Director Chat - 21st Century Classrooms

I’m sitting in a session at the MI Google Summit¹ and I’m listening to Jessica Winstanley melt my heart with adorable images of elementary students working through the mechanics of blogging with markers, sticky notes and reflective thought. Her session was focused on getting students (and teachers) to start blogging, and provided a host of reason why you might want to start blogging in the classroom. It instantly took me back to my post a few weeks ago about how educators should approach the blogging process; give me the "why" first, and then figure out the mechanics of "how". Jessica did a wonderful job, barely touching upon the tools for blogging, and instead focused on the why. So I thought I’d share her compelling examples for why you should get your students blogging, a full baker’s dozen! Alright, so there are 14 ideas here, but 13 made for a better title, poetically speaking Jessica Winstanley’s Ideas for Student Blogging Share class news with parents. Provide a list of homework or useful links. Link to online photo albums to share pictures with the classroom community. Discussion forum with parents/students on material discussed in class. Use as a medium for students to share their writing. Elementary Specific Book Blog - Class blog where students are the authors and they blog about the books they are reading Class News - Student guest bloggers blog each week about what is happening in the classroom Current Events - Students blog about current events: what is happening and their thoughts and opinions on the topic. Diary of a (Insert class pet here) - Students can blog about the life cycle and happenings of the class pet. I Spy - Have students post photos or pictures related to the content area and have them discuss why the picture is relevant.  Other students then can comment and expand the discussion. Secondary Specific Book Discussion - Blog about a novel and have fellow students who are reading the same novel comment and discuss. Living History - students conduct original interviews with local senior citizens, placing text, images, and audio clips on their blog as a digital archive of local history. Class Scribe -  Each day, a student is the class scribe, responsible for posting the class notes to the blog. With clever formatting and the use of pictures and graphs, lessons are shared each day. Discussions in the comments. Lab Reports - Blog about experiments conducted in class, like a lab report.  Through commenting, compare notes with classmates to evaluate what worked or didn’t for each group. Want more ideas? Jessica was kind enough to share her entire presentation with me, and you can view it here, or embedded below! I couldn’t embed her original version, so below is a copy. To keep up with changes to the document use the previous link for her "live" presentation. 1 The MI Google conference is easily one of the most affordable and well run Google Summits around compared to the hundreds of dollars being asked of attendees for Google Summits in many other states.  

It’s no secret that I’m not the biggest fan of chasing after the perfect app. Even when I was in the classroom, I would often give my students a few websites that I felt were appropriate, and then have them curate and identify the games, activities, and resources they found to be the most valuable. Sure, I have some favorite apps, but since I haven’t been in the classroom for 4 and a half years now, I realize that what I find valuable is likely quite different than what classroom teachers currently find valuable (and more importantly, practical). Which is why when I work with teachers looking for ideas for their iPads, or any tablet for that matter, I tend to focus on applications of one of the most powerful apps built into most mobile devices these days; the camera app! I know what some of you are thinking…"oh please, Ben!" Give me a break. There is nothing innovative, creative, or special about using digital cameras for learning. And yet, there are still many school districts that actively block access to the cameras on devices entirely (I would mention names, but I have colleagues at schools where this is the case). Couple that reality with the growing purchases of Chromebooks and other low cost computing devices in the name of "test readiness", and you aren’t exactly priming teachers to immerse themselves for a visual paradigm of learning. So when I decided to present for this year’s K-12 Online Conference, I went ahead and took one of my recent workshops, paired it down a bit, and turned it into a primer for getting started with visual learning activities using any tablet’s camera. I even included some rationale thanks to the Common Core Standards, in case anyone is interested in showing parents the positive side of the CCSS. And did I mention it’s just plain fun?! I’ve enjoyed leading a couple of workshops around this, as it gets participants up out of their seats, taking pictures and video around conference centers, and then coming back to share their work and get excited about exploring one another’s ideas. Per the K-12 Online Conference organizer’s request, I couldn’t post any video of my own about the presentation until I handed it off to them, so below is the video I crafted! Want to see some of the great visual activities that my workshop attendees created this summer? Click HERE for a growing list of visual ways for students to present learning across content areas using just the camera app. And here’s a shout out to the entire Games & Gammification strand presentations, in case you’re curious about more playful learning experiences in the classroom.

Apparently my post earlier this week sharing Jessica Winstanley’s ideas for student blogging was rather popular. So I’m going for broke, and sharing a tool that I created last week to help new teachers start blogging. Again, we’re going to focus on "why blog", not on the mechanics of blogging. Why? Because it’s far easier to fail by just setting up a blogging space and telling yourself that you’re going to blog, then develop an actual plan for using it as an important piece of your blended learning environment. I’ve been helping teachers in my district get started with blogging for a few years now, and some kick butt right out of the gate thanks to a healthy background of previous blogging experience. However, many are new to both the concept of openly sharing thoughts on the web, and the dedication it takes to blog regularly with or for students. Usually I’ll get a blog setup with a teacher, visit a classroom, and help the students work through the creation of shared expectations for their blogging space, and then hand things over to the teacher. I’ve been poor at following up, and giving teachers a simple tool to have them think through a few simple steps before they begin the blogging journey. Until last week. I decided to take my collected notes, thoughts, and scribbles from across my digital and analog writing spaces, and boiled them all down to a few simple questions and placed them in a Google Doc to serve as a template. Now every time a teacher asks me about blogging, I have a quick "go to" document to walk through with them, and hopefully provide enough of a game plan for them to blog successfully. Click here for a Google Doc Template of "Blogging for Success."

I did a search on YouTube today for the terms "video story problem." It returned more than 16 million results. Interestingly enough, many of the top results are from people creating video story problems that I’ve never met, have never been in one of my workshops, and have no links back to where they got the idea; and that’s awesome! Loving that so many other educators and students are starting to play with video to help create publicly available examples of the old "learning is messy" adage! I really enjoyed this one created by William Campillo, who tasked us with estimating the thickness of a single sticky note by using a stack of notes and one on its side. If I find some time, I might try to start curating all of the examples out there that I see popping up on YouTube. Or better yet, maybe create a hub site where all of the videos can live, be sorted and categorized, and maybe even start to build it up as a resource beyond the Video Story Problem Channel. For now, I’m just excited to see so many others creating!

Alright, so the voters of my school district’s community passed the bond. But I’m still excited as the two previous bond attempts failed. That means we’ve got a whole lot of changes in store for the district in the near future, and there’s a lot of questions to explore! This week’s episode of Tech Director Chat touches on a lot of bond-related questions, but is also balanced out by ongoing issues that many school districts have related to technology; how do you bring students into the decision making process, what projects take priority over others when money is scarce, and general questions about "life, the universe, and everything." This week see’s the continuation of "Stump Pete", in which Pete shares his complete disdain for Disco, and introduces actual names of those submitting questions. It feels like we’re getting closer and closer to Car Talk (RIP Tom Magliozzi), but I’m not getting any ideas of grandeur. This podcast is first and foremost for the teachers in my district, and I hope serves as a model for others to adopt, build upon, or tinker with so they can create new inroads with their own teaching staff. You can go listen, download, or subscribe to the Podcast via iTunes using this link, or listen using the embedded player below. Timestamps for this week’s questions: 1:17 We passed both our bonds? YAY! 1:53 What has Pete been up to today? 2:58 Did Pete bring anything back from Prague for us? 3:48 Does the passing of the bond mean that we will have 1:1 computing? 4:55 Can you give us an example of a project that’s been put "on hold" as we’ve been building up laptops? 7:30 Jeff asks, what does the passing of the bond mean for each building? 8:54 What are the plans for the architects and bond consultants for getting input from teachers and the community? 10:10 Wait, we have to hire a technology consultant for the bond? Isn’t that Pete’s job? 12:45 Nicole from Twitter asks, how do you get more students involved with requesting apps and websites for being unblocked? 17:44 Angie asks, if you could ask Stephen Hawking anything, what would you ask him? 19:43 Stump Pete! Jeff asks, what was the first major sound innovation after "Rock and Roll?" Tech Director Chat - OMG! We Passed the Bond!

Planet Money is an amazing podcast. If you aren’t listening, you should be. If you’re an economics, political science, or business teacher, it’s one of the richest pieces of media being produced today that breaks down complicated business and economic issues into easy to digest and engaging audio. If you’re a regular NPR listener, you’ve probably heard their pieces during longer news segments. If you’re an avid podcast listen, go subscribe…..now. It really is great story telling capable of turning the dullest of subjects into engrossing stories; including how the story of two pasta factories can help you understand the basics of the entire Italian economy. Net Neutrality isn’t anything new; it’s been discussed and argued for more than a decade. In fact, the Planet Money team was able to easily explain the amazing power that the internet can afford even the smallest of innovators through an anecdote about Skype, one of the most prevalent video conferencing tools on the internet today. Did you know it was started by a small development team from Estonia? I digress. Planet Money actually did an amazing job of describing both sides of the net neutrality issue two years ago in June of 2012. I won’t go too far into the description of their podcast, as it’s much more engaging if you listen yourself. Suffice it to say, Planet Money breaks the issue down into easily understood terms, with the perfect dose of humor and anecdotes. And it’s relatively bite-sized at only 13 minutes, making it a good listen during a commute, or during your plan time. You can go listen on the NPR website, or using the embedded player below (if it’s working).

If you aren’t subscribed to the PBS Idea Channel on Youtube, I’ll give you a few minutes to excuse yourself while you click on over and rectify that error. …. …. Go ahead, I’ll wait. …. …. Still haven’t clicked over yet? Click here! Or here! Or even here! Seriously, the PBS Idea Channel is a brilliant blend of ADHD media overload, memes, pop and internet cultural, all rolled up into the wonderfully intellectual ether that PBS tends to create. In short, it’s a "thinking millennial’s" internet show. I’ve blogged about it before, but I’ve been catching up on my viewing this week, and I stumbled across their episode from July 2014, in which the host, Mike Rugnetta, describes Frozen as a fairytale meant to critique other fairytales. And he actually does a really great job of supporting that premise; compared to the original source material (Hans Christian Andersen’s "The Snow Queen"), the evil queen is made good, a younger sister is invented, the handsome prince is turned evil, and the evil Duke is turned into a bumbling simpleton. Good characters wield "evil magic", the true love at the heart of the story is that of siblings, not love interests, and it presents a "vaguely progressive" notion of what fairytales should be. You can watch below, or right here! Where am I going with this? The entire episode is built around the question of "WHY" Frozen was so popular, and Mike’s thesis of it being a critique on other fairytales is what he claims gave it universal appeal. How amazingly fun would it be to offer up the same challenge to you students? Task them to build their own case as to why "Frozen" was so popular, and then challenge them to support it using literature, video, audio, pop culture, and any other form of media. It would make for an interesting mix of traditional persuasive writing and more modern digital storytelling tropes. If I were in a secondary English classroom I would LOVE to challenge my students with something like this as a "quickfire" exercise at least twice a month; if nothing else, the playfulness of it would be helpful to lighten things up from time to time.