In a few hours I’ll be heading into Atlantic City for the first of my two days working and learning at the NJEA Convention. I’ve gone every year for as long as I can remember (I even went as a guest in 2002, the year before I started teaching, when I was just beginning my search for a teaching position.) Once again, I’ll be presenting in High Tech Hall with many friends and colleagues. Here’s my schedule, which, in comparison to years past, is fairly light: Thursday 11/7 9:00 - 10:00 | Teacher to Teacher Learning Lab | Engineering is Elementary: Transforming "Computer Lab" into a STEM Course (My presentation is not online but you can click here for my ‘resources’ page) 11:00 - 1:00 | Technology Integration Showcase | Engineering is Elementary: Transforming "Computer Lab" into a STEM Course (My presentation is not online but you can click here for my ‘resources’ page) 1:00 - 4:oo | The "Brainiac Bar" - an instructional "helpdesk," if you will, where I and several of my colleagues will be ready to answer ANY instructional question or problem you may have! Yes, really! It’s located in High Tech Hall, you can’t miss it. Friday 11/8 11:30 - 12:30 | Keynote by Chris Lehmann, Founding Principal, Science Leadership Academy 1:00 - 3:oo | The "Brainiac Bar" I shied away from a heavier presentation load this year because I wanted to invest in my own learning for a change. Any time not listed above will be spent roaming the halls in search of interesting sessions on STEM, Technology Literacy Education, Classroom Management, and whatever else I find interesting. I’ll close with a photo of my daughter Holly and a friend at the NJEA Convention in 2007. She doesn’t come with me anymore. We presented together in 2009. They grow up too quickly … and all of a sudden hitting the Convention with your dad isn’t the fun it once was. Oh well! It was great while it lasted! Have a great Convention, everyone! See you in Atlantic City! -kj

If you're having trouble maintaining your focus at work, check out these tips. They're bound to help.Post from: The eLearning Coach12 Tips To Improve Your Focus

In January 2013 I  participated in a workshop sponsored by the National Science Foundation to help establish a 10 year vision to reconceptualize postsecondary learning. This past week our co-convenors, Chris Dede, Harvard University and Eric Grimson, MIT, released the 47 page report that captured the results of that meeting. Entitled New Technology-based Models for Postsecondary Learning: Conceptual Frameworks and Research Agendas, this is a comprehensive overview of promises, opportunities and challenges that will keep all of we post-secondary learning stakeholders on our toes for the next decade. You can download the working draft of this paper here. The basic premises addressed include the following: Advances in technology and in knowledge about expertise, learning, and assessment have the potential to reshape the many forms of education and training past matriculation from high school. In the next decade, higher education, military and workplace training, and professional development must all transform to exploit the opportunities of a new era, leveraging emerging technology-based models that can make learning more efficient and possibly improve student support, all at lower cost for a broader range of learners.  Potential risks must be managed, including those arising from the disruption of established delivery economics in our current learning institutions, the variable quality of learning outcomes these new models offer today, and the technical and conceptual challenges of better understanding how to design, develop, and implement innovative capabilities in ways that reliably deliver on their promise. Workshop participants developed a framework for understanding this sea change and sketched steps towards a research agenda for realizing its benefits while avoiding pitfalls. Contributors to this report include Daniel E. Atkins, W.K. Kellogg Professor of Community Information, and Professor of Information and Computer Science, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor. Lori Breslow, Director, Teaching and Learning Laboratory, MIT. John Cherniavsky, Senior Advisor, Division of Research on Learning, NSF. J.D. Fletcher, Senior Research Staff Member, Institute for Defense Analyses. Diana Oblinger, President and CEO, EDUCAUSE. Roy Pea, David Jacks Professor of Education and Learning Sciences, Stanford University. James W. Pellegrino, Distinguished Professor and Co-Director, Learning Sciences Research Institute, University of Illinois at Chicago. Bror Saxberg, Chief Learning Officer, Kaplan, Inc. James H. Shelton III, Assistant Deputy Secretary for Innovation and Improvement,U.S. Department of Education. Russell Shilling, CAPT, MSC, USN, Program Manager, DARPA. Greg Tobin, President, English, Math, and Student Success, Pearson Higher Education and yours truly, Ellen Wagner, Executive Director, Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education Cooperative for Educational Technologies. Arthur Josephson, Harvard Graduate School of Education, was our researcher.

No need to fit a square peg in a round hole. There are lots of options for instructional designers and developers.Post from: The eLearning CoachFinding Your Place In Instructional Design

This post is part of my continuing series of weekly lesson summaries. My goal is to give parents & caregivers in our school community the resources needed to extend student learning at home, and to share my professional practice with teacher colleagues around the world in the hopes of improving my craft. Synopsis: Kindergarten students enjoyed a design challenge involving Dixie cups, cardstock and a Beanie Baby named "Crabby McCrabbypants"; First Graders worked on their word processing skills with Learning.com’s EasyTech in advance of a lesson we’ll be doing next week in the PC lab; Second Graders "did the impossible" by designing a structure strong enough to hold a ream of paper off the table using only ten 1″ strips of paper; Third and Fourth Graders continued working with Google Spreadsheets, specifically, with graphs and formulas, respectively. Week ending 11/15/13 Kindergarten What we learned / did / explored together: "What do Engineers do?" It’s certainly not a question asked of most Kindergarten students, but WE ask it, because we teach Kinders about engineering! (Our working definition: "engineers are people who use what they know about math and science, plus their creativity, to design technologies that solve problems.") Today’s lesson was a design challenge based on the Engineering is Elementary activity, "Tower Power Returns." (We did the original "Tower Power" last year with 3×5 index cards.) Pairs of students were given 10 Dixie cups, two sheets of cardstock, scissors and some tape and were told they had to design a structure to hold "Crabby McCrabbypants" (a Ty Teenie Beanie Baby) as high as possible out of the water to protect him from predators. Then we (the adults) got out of the way. What I observed / inferred / connected: The record, a 10-cup stack (shown above) was in Mr. Battistini’s class on Friday. Judicious use of masking tape and cardstock made the towering structure possible and JUST stable enough to support the weight of "Crabby McCrabbypants" (trust me, the skill required to gently place him on top was substantial.) Cheers literally erupted after every successful "Crabby Test" of a structure. Myriad designs were evident including features we’d never seen before … waterslides, diving boards, steps (to make it easier for Crabby to climb up), landscaping (seascaping?), and even one creative team that decided to shove Crabby into a Dixie Cup for his own protection! Teamwork was the hardest part of the lesson, as expected. Kindergarten students don’t collaborate a lot so most kids needed some time to adjust. Many insisted on creating their own towers at first until we made it clear they had to combine each into a single design. Fortunately there were no major personality clashes and everything proceeded normally/successfully throughout the entire lesson. Everyone was successful; every design could be improved; everyone had a terrific time. Students finished by drawing a picture of their successful design. What students can do at home: Plastic or paper cups make excellent stacking tools and so this lesson can easily be re-created at home. Introducing additional materials like paper and tape spark creativity and imagination. The Engineering Design Process is simple, logical and fun to explain and review. Challenge your child to IMPROVE his or her design and explain how they did! First Grade What we learned / did / explored together: Students used the Learning.com EasyTech service to brush up on their word processing skills. After a warmup on uppercase and lowercase letter matching, they completed two or three lessons (depending on how much time we had) that helped them master the basics of working with a word processor. (Note the outstanding hand position shown above!) This lesson laid the groundwork for what we’ll be doing next week. What I observed / inferred / connected: We love EasyTech, it’s wonderfully designed and easy to use, kids take to it immediately, the learning curve is gentle, they learn at their own pace … it can’t be beat. I tell the students that it’s "a computer teacher in the computer." They get it! What students can do at home: Use EasyTech! I’ve provided the logon information before, if you don’t have it, contact me! Second Grade What we learned / did / explored together: We have that Walt Disney quote on the wall in my classroom for a reason: I really, really, REALLY want it to sink in. (Wonder and possibility are central themes in my classroom.) I start by welcoming the students and telling them that today they will do the impossible … and then explain that they are to, working with a partner, using only ten 1″ strips of paper, design a structure strong enough to support AT LEAST one ream of paper off the desk. Audible gasps can be heard and when I ask if anyone thinks it’s impossible to raise their hand, everyone does. I then show them a picture of a huge stack from last year. They’re instantly hooked. We talk about the Engineering Design Process phases and they brainstorm with their partner for the first minute. I give them about ten minutes to try some designs (some discover the "winning" solution right away) and then I call everyone over to the SMART Board to watch the youtube video above. We talk about material engineering and cement columns in particular in the context of the new bridge into Ocean City. We explain that engineers use this kind of testing all the time to determine which concrete mixture to use for a given application. We then talk about the shape of the column and its inherent strength before sending the students back to their tables to continue working. It’s not long before everyone realizes the cylinders are the best way to go and all have successful designs. We "compete" by having teams come up with designs that use the fewest amount of strips and hold the most reams of paper. The record set this week: 16 reams stacked on just 8 strips of paper! What I observed / inferred / connected: It’s chaotic at times but the learning and teamwork is evident from the start. Their designs get progressively simpler as they realize all they need to do is make cylinders. Eventually all figure this out and the race is on! By the end of class it’s virtually impossible to hear because they are all outdoing each other - on a task they all thought was impossible just moments before. What students can do at home: This project can be replicated at home but must be done so safely and with objects that can’t be damaged. Books can be used to create the stack as long as they are not too heavy and there are enough of them. The strips of paper should be 1″ wide. A time limit could also be imposed. Third Grade What we learned / did / explored together: We continued our "virtual" Halloween Candy analysis by investigating "virtual" data compiled for the entire third grade. I wanted students to be comfortable reading tables and locating information based on cell addresses. We’d built formulas the week before (and will be re-visiting them next week). Google Spreadsheets makes graphing easy (too easy, in fact) but progress is progress and we’ve got to keep working with modern tools. Anyway, once we showed the students how to create the graphs, we turned them loose, and they finished in no time, generating and customizing the charts. What I learned / observed / inferred: This went better towards the end of the week as my teaching improved; the chart features were new to me as well and it took some time to adjust. Overall this lesson was a winner and I could tell the kids felt they’d accomplished a lot. What students can do at home: Google Spreadsheets can be accessed at home, just go to the Google Apps login page: https://docs.google.com and sign in. If you have any problems, contact me! Fourth Grade What we covered / did / explored: Fourth grade also continued working with spreadsheets, this time, with formulas. I aggregated the data the students entered last week and presented it to the students. We discussed what trends or information would be interesting to analyze and how that could be done electronically. I demonstrated proper formula syntax and cell selection as well as techniques for copying and pasting. Most importantly we talked about the need for "healthy skepticsm" when working with spreadsheet data. I intentionally buried some errors for the kids to find, numbers that didn’t look right. They didn’t disappoint; we located and corrected them. Some students also "outed" themselves when we did the final copying of the formulas - some had simply entered the numbers they saw on my screen into the cells where they were supposed to enter formulas. Naturally, the totals copied across - not formulas! Many "light bulbs" went off over heads as they realized what had happened and why spreadsheets can be so tricky to work with. What I observed / inferred / connected: Students are going to need a lot more exposure to spreadsheets for this to stick. What students can do at home: Google Spreadsheets can be accessed at home, just go to the Google Apps login page: https://docs.google.com and sign in. If you have any problems, contact me!

If you post the term "Big Data" in your Google search window today, more than 2 billion google search results will appear. If you perform a similar search on Bing, you will see that more than 1,790,000 Big Data links have been added to the Internet in the past 24 hours alone. Clearly, there is big interest in big data. This graphic by Matt Turck and Shivon Zilis is an exceedingly helpful image for understanding the breadth and complexity of the Big Data landscape. Matt Turck's blogpost  also provides great information for understanding some of where this emerging market is taking us.      For those of us working in post-secondary education circles, the emergent interests in big data, analytics, learning analytics and related evidence-based decision-making endeavors have been inspired by possibilities of better experiences, more personalization and better behavioral targeting. Still most education stakeholders who are giving learning analytics some consideration may be surprised to see the depth, breath and sophistication of the big data world.  While WCET's work on the PAR Framework has certainly contributed to a growing awareness on the power of predictive analytics for academic risk identification and the value of collaborative, multi-institutional data mining to improve student success, we are mindful that our student success focus touches a relatively narrow, targeted part of the Big Data picture. This graphic offers a more complete picture of the total ecosystem.

This post is part of my continuing series of weekly lesson summaries. My goal is to give parents & caregivers in our school community the resources needed to extend student learning at home, and to share my professional practice with teacher colleagues around the world in the hopes of improving my craft. Synopsis: Kindergarteners created images of things they are thankful for, using a great free painting application called PaintGO; First Graders also worked on the "Thankful For" theme, but created a word processing document using the PCs in our Elementary Lab #1 and Stationery Studio software; Second Graders built and programmed LEGO robots; Third and Fourth graders worked with Google Spreadsheets, the Third Graders learning about formulas and the Fourth Graders learning about graphs (histograms, in specific.) Week ending 11/22/13 Kindergarten What we learned / did / explored together: Students warmed up with some Alphabet and Pattern Matching activities to work on their visual and mousing skills (the latter still need work!) before we moved on to the main lesson involving ABCYa.com’s excellent PaintGO application. We first had a conversation on the "cubes" about things we’re thankful for (no shortage of suggestions!) and then we reviewed the components of the drawing app - drawing area, tool box, color box, etc. - and then the students demonstrated on the SMART Board how to create their various illustrations (people, the Earth, houses, pets, etc.) Once they finished, we saved the files for later printing (I’ll be getting them to the students this week.) What I observed / inferred / connected: I was amazed at how well kids recalled this program’s user interface. They correctly identified the critical user interface components and were instantly productive. It’s amazing what they retained only having done the lesson on digital artwork no long ago. What students can do at home: Check out ABCYa’s  PaintGO and the other great educational applications on the Kindergarten Symbaloo. Challenge your child to create something magical! First Grade What we learned / did / explored together: We just finished learning recently about Word Processing and so a "Thankful for" project was a natural context choice this past week. Students used Stationery Studio to create simple documents, adding text at levels they were comfortable with, while applying/reviewing the concepts we’d just learned: cursor, spacing, capitalization, etc. These were printed in color and will either be going home or used for other projects in the classroom. Students also practiced their log on / log off skills; they still need work but are getting better every week. What I observed / inferred / connected: Stationery Studio is a terrific application, ideal for early writers. It’s not perfect, it can be difficult to navigate multiple pages, but it’s pretty intuitive and the output looks amazing. It’s one of our favorite programs when using the PCs in the Elementary Computer Lab #1. What students can do at home: Stationery Studio is not a web-based ppl Check out the First Grade Symbaloo for fun and helpful learning activities! Second Grade What we learned / did / explored together: ROBOTS!!! These LEGO WeDo robotics kits, provided by the NCS PTO, were FANTASTIC this week. We definitely had to work hard to finish the model in the time we had, and only half the class could work this past week (the rest will finish this coming week), but, most teams were successful at building and many were successful at programming the finished model too. The result: this video! http://www.flickr.com/photos/kjarrett/10963430366/. Programming is a focus area for us in Second Grade this year and we will be utilizing many tools and applications to do so.  We will explore Scratch, Google Blockly and many other similar programs designed to help the kids learn the basics of programming. Some will be adept at it, others won’t, all will have the opportunity to learn! What I observed / inferred / connected: "Less Us, More Them." It’s hard sometimes not to intervene when you see a team "going into the weeds," but, it’s really important to do exactly that. The best progress, overall, were those teams who worked out their problems on their own. What students can do at home: Scratch and Google Blockly are two great tools to learn programming. Another, called Light-Bot, is on my Second Grade Symbaloo page. Think about checking out a LEGO WeDo set for your budding computer programmer. Third Grade What we learned / did / explored together: After a warmup with Typing Pal, students spent another week working with Google Spreadsheets, this time, learning about formula structure as well as how to correctly copy formulas. We used the formulas to point out and understand trends in the data. What I learned / observed / inferred: Despite my best efforts to make this "realistic," in the end, it was a little on the abstract side for our third graders. In the end, however, they were all successful! What students can do at home: Typing Pal is always a great choice for work at home, it helps tremendously and is a focus area for students in third grade. Google Spreadsheets can be accessed at home, just go to the Google Apps login page: https://docs.google.com and sign in. If you have any problems, contact me! Fourth Grade What we covered / did / explored: After a warmup with Typing Pal, students spent another week working with Google Spreadsheets, this time, learning about histograms and normal distributions. We used the spreadsheet data in our footprint measurements database to create histograms and analyze trends. What I observed / inferred / connected: Students quickly grasped the technical aspects of both the normal distribution and creating the histograms. Fortunately, Google Spreadsheets makes it easy! What students can do at home: Typing Pal is always a great choice for work at home, it helps tremendously and is a critical skill for students in fourth grade. Google Spreadsheets can be accessed at home, just go to the Google Apps login page: https://docs.google.com and sign in. If you have any problems, contact me!

On May 9, 2013 I will have the pleasure of joining the crew at #Lrnchat for a session on the topic of learning analytics. You will find us on Twitter, Thursday, 8:30 pm ET/5:30 PT. Look for us at #lrnchat, follow along at @lrnchat.  #Lrnchat is a regularly scheduled event that takes place every Thursday evening.  Participants using any number of tweeting tools (such as Tweetdeck and Tweedgrid) to keep track of the messages that fly around among the session participants. It is hosted and facilitated by a number of learning and development social media experts who shall remain nameless until I get their permission to drop their names. Questions get asked, responses get posted, conversations get started, friendships get launched. It's amazing how much one can pack into 140 characters!  The name of this particular post, in anticipation of tomorrow's #Lrnchat, comes from one of my favorite analytics parables. In March of 2009, the lead designer from Google resigned in protest to what he described as an engineering culture that was obsessed by numbers. Douglas Bowman offered his reasons for resigning  in a blogpost entitled "Goodbye Google". In his explanation he gave the following examples of how data-obsessed Google had become: "Yes, it’s true that a team at Google couldn’t decide between two blues, so they’re testing 41 shades between each blue to see which one performs better. I had a recent debate over whether a border should be 3, 4 or 5 pixels wide, and was asked to prove my case. I can’t operate in an environment like that. I’ve grown tired of debating such minuscule design decisions. There are more exciting design problems in this world to tackle." In closing, he wrote that "I’ll miss working with the incredibly smart and talented people I got to know there. But I won’t miss a design philosophy that lives or dies strictly by the sword of data." I remember being struck by that phrase as the perfect way to describe the double-edged benefits and risks that analytics bring to discussions of learning, achievement, progress, success. I offer this as something that each of us should keep in mind as we gravitate toward a greater use of enterprise data in our decision-making.  I know we will have 90 minutes to talk about this. In anticpation of the conversation can I just offer this observation - It helps to have an idea about the problem you are trying to solve before you dive into an analytics campaign. And once you DO know, you need to be prepared to respond. Problem identification, without taking action, is almost worse than not knowing at all. Here are a few references that I hope you will find to be useful. Happy reading! See you on Twitter. Background References Goodbye, Google The blogpost written by designer Douglas Bowman when he resigned from Google in protest to the data culture around decisionmaking. http://stopdesign.com/archive/2009/03/20/goodbye-google.html The Gawker story that picked up the story of event leading to Bowman’s resignation from Google http://gawker.com/5177144/googles-data-fetish-drives-away-its-top-designer Articles I've written on learning analytics: http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/data-changes-everything-delivering-promise-learning-analytics-higher-education http://www.astd.org/Publications/Magazines/TD/TD-Archive/2012/08/8-Realities-Learning-Professionals-Need-to-Know-About-Analytics Recent tweets on Big Data -related topics by @edwsonoma The Big Data Landscape http://bit.ly/12KXpvA  11 Big Data myths http://bit.ly/15CD26B  The Surprising Predictive Power of Analytics http://lnkd.in/M2VS9j  The Rising Costs Of Misunderstanding Big Data http://lnkd.in/fBGWVP  Ten things you need to know about Big Data http://tinyurl.com/cabxeam  What's the skillset of a talented #BigData Scientist? http://ow.ly/kNKw7   

Yes, you may have heard, it’s true - the NCS K4STEMLAB is getting a 3D printer! At NO COST to the district! Makerbot Replicator 2 - image © Makerbot Industries Makerbot Industries and Donor’s Choose have teamed up to create the Makerbot Academy, an initiative designed "to put a MakerBot Desktop 3D Printer in every school in the United States of America." I don’t recall where or when I saw the announcement, but I applied, the project was approved, and within hours, we’d received the funding - a combination of contributions from the Mozitis and Syed families of Northfield, and, the Makerbot people themselves. The retail value of this "Makerbot Bundle?" Around $2,600! It even includes the materials we’ll need and a warranty! I’m so excited I could spit! If you don’t know what a Makerbot Replicator 2 is, watch this three minute video: Yes but what will we DO with this ridiculously awesome piece of technology? My answer: unleashing student creativity, 100 microns at a time. The printer will come with everything we need to use it right away - software, supplies, everything - all we need is a place to put it (I’ve already got two options in mind) and a PC to connect it to (already have one of those, too.) Then there’s the learning curve - I’m all over that - I expect to spend much of the upcoming Winter Break learning all there is to know about this device and its capabilities, the software that can be used to create models (like Tinkercad and 123D). But wait, there’s more! You can even use MINECRAFT to make and print designs! I kid you not! How incredibly, unbelievably cool. 3D printers are taking the world by storm. Read here about a Dad who used a 3d printer to create a prosthetic robot arm for his son. But let’s be honest, there is more than a bit of hype here. Clarence Fisher’s excellent blog post, "Are 3D printers trendy?" raises some very valid points. The key, to me, is how much my students will be in control of this device, and how effectively it can be used in my classroom to inspire, to inform, and to teach. That last part’s on me. We like to say that my classroom is about two things: WONDER and POSSIBILITY. (It’s about a lot more than that obviously but work with me here.) I can’t think of a device better suited to the task. And we’re getting it at no cost to the school. I’m off to start dreaming up some contexts lesson plans design challenges discussions about this device, to see what the kids can come up with. Gotta run! -kj-

Stop spinning your wheels. Check out a review of Essential Articulate Studio 09 instead.Post from: The eLearning CoachLearning Articulate From A Book