I hate internet memes. I have to be honest in saying that I never respond to them. The place they feel especially strange is on my blog. This is one of the few places where my learning is allowed to run about unfettered. Perhaps the meme concept feels like high school did back in my day when I was given really specific things to perform for a particular assignment. We all know that growth occurs from many of those situations where we have been forced to think within the guidelines of a particular set of “rules.” However, I have always seen the inside of my Edublogs dashboard as a place where I run the show, dictate the pace, put forward the agenda, and set the course for my own growth.
With all that said, I felt since Tania Sheko tagged me in this one… it was one I couldn’t refuse. Tania writes Brave New World from her home in Australia. Tania is a faithful contributor here at nashworld, and someone whose work and opinions I respect deeply. So really, that makes it pretty easy to see why this was my first official play-along with a blogging meme. I can’t quite think of a better reason to step to the plate for such a thing, for this is a meme of reflection.
This meme is the “4R’s” meme for bloggers. I am to troll through all of my old posts and pick one that fits each of the following R’s:
RANTS
RESOURCES
REFLECTIONS
REVELATIONS
I am to point to a post that fits each of the categories and tell why it was important, why it had lasting value or impact, and how I might update it for today.
Reflection
Actually, I spent some time back in April around the time of my first “blogversary” pulling an excerpt from each post throughout my first year behind the wheel of this blog. I stuck the outline on a separate page entitled: Year One Archive. So actually… I had a pretty slick little tool for surveying all of my posts for this reply. Still, this little exercise did require some pretty deep reflection to pick just one for each of the R’s. So for that- thanks Tania.
Rants- this could fit any number of posts here. However, I chose a post from last November for this one. Increasing Our Level of “Vitamin A“ was a post about the need for administration at all levels to step up and improve their support and modeling of current educational technology within the profession. I challenged administrators to book a trip to Washington D.C. for NECC 2009 and the unveiling of the refreshed NETS-A standards for leaders in this area.
This one was posted at 10:00pm on November 13th. At noon on November 14th our district’s Chief Operations Officer, Rick Hartigan, was sitting at the table in my principal’s office to let us know that, “he has heard the call” and that the district “was supporting this ideal and behind us 100%.” I had received timely feedback here before then, but I think you can see how impactful that little post was. What was the follow through, you ask? Mr. Hartigan booked a trip to NECC and attended like a pro. In fact, I remember one particular afternoon when he accompanied me to the “blogger’s cafe” to chat with some of the member of my burgeoning PLN.
The blogger’s cafe at an event like this is the most locale on the premises. I quickly introduced him to Wesley Fryer, Dean Shareski, and Terry Kaminski. The five of us stood and chatted about some of the more crucial aspects of an educational technology “upgrade” in schools today. Rick stepped up and asked as many questions as were sitting on the forefront of his brain, and those three graciously took the time to share their input. That one set of events did potentially more than anything else I have done on nashworld to date.
Resources- this one was tough. In the end, I chose the one single post with the most comments to date, Trolling my PLN for Edtech Vision. In all seriousness, this is a classic post to demonstrate the fact that sometimes the comments on a post are far more valuable than the initial content. This was, of course, the goal of the post to begin with. You should proceed through that comment field with a pen & paper (or your stickies app) and record as many titles and names as you can. This is a true wealth of information and opinions from what I consider to be some really top-notch thinkers.
Reflections- This category could mean many things. Nearly all of my posts fit this one in some way. Yet, Inspire First, Instruct Later required perhaps some of the most personal reflection. This post was written close on the heels of a family death and the birth of my youngest little girl. As Clay Burrell noted in the comments, “Good luck on the newcomer, and sorry about the loss of the old-timer. Quite a cycle you’re experiencing.” The meat of the post speaks to the affective needs of our students. I argue here that these needs must be met before trodding down any sort of prescriptive curricular path. The closest competition (and this one treads awfully close to “revelations”) is the poem-post I dropped after the birth of our youngest daughter, Neve.
Revelations- Since the first three speak to the educational technology and instructional coaching elements of my life as an educator, I thought it apropos to toss in one from the world of biology. Where are the seeds in an orange? speaks to the disconnect our children have with the very food they nourish themselves with on a daily basis. That day, a student of mine confessed during a lab that he had never seen an orange with seeds. In the real scope of things, this scary fact is likely is as important, if not more, than any of the aforementioned. Not only are young people detached from the food they eat as actual biological entities, we as educators may as well be increasingly detached from the world our students have grown up immersed in.
So in keeping with the spirit of virality (if I may coin that term) I am to tag a few others to continue the meme. No, this will not keep you in God’s graces. It will certainly not bring you great wealth from the shores of Nigeria. It may not even make you happy upon first considering it. However, I do respect these folks, and would certainly enjoy seeing their responses to this project. It did make me reflect, Tania. So thank you. Oh…. and don’t forget to tag your post with: #postsofthepast.
My turn
I hereby tag Michael Doyle, “Science Teacher” who constantly inspires me; Punya Mishra, “Punya Mishra’s Web” who is about as creative a person in our field as can be; Shelly Blake-Plock, “Teach Paperless” who has recently been one of my favorite bloggers; and Steve Dembo of “Teach42” who put us “on assignment” with his 30 Days To Being a Better Blogger challenge last Autumn.
Happy anniversary to “nashworld.“ This post is the 65th of the year, and it comes exactly one year after my first post on April 21st, 2008. Wow. Looking back at that post, it was quite clear I was full of questions for the coming year of study and reflection, but very shy of answers. In fact, this blog was initially titled “virtual southside” that first month. My first plan was for this space to be a group blog to facilitate PD for our brand-spanking-new tech cohort starting in June.
Forming a purpose
Then I found Ning. In one weekend, it was clear to me that this platform would be a far better, and more flexible, match for our school’s edtech PD mission. It also served to bring some comfort for our staff in the world of social media. Though we control membership to the site, it is certainly a more free-wheeling place than a simple group blog. It was the decentralized nature of a Ning network that I loved. I didn’t want to drive “virtual southside.” I didn’t want anyone to drive. I wanted to be merely another loud voice on a very enthusiastic and speedy bus.
So after a quick rename, nashworld became more of a personal place for reflection, sharing, and synthesis of thought. I do drive this bus. However, I had my first guest move up from the passenger section just this month. Though I certainly do have an amazing passenger list here, this is where the metaphor breaks down, for the readers of this blog certainly help steer my thoughts and words with their comments. To those of you who have put in your two cents here, I thank you greatly. You have helped to develop many of the thoughts and beliefs I currently own.
Year One Archive
A couple of months ago, when I started to really reflect on what blogging has meant to me over the past year, I decided to create a different type of archive for the blog. If you look up, you’ll notice that just to the right of the “About” page is a link to a new page entitled: “Year One Archive.” This page lists every post I have written over the course of the year by month- with somewhat of an abstract-like summary. I hope this provides yet another way to navigate the site. It certainly isn’t a quick and efficient way, but it does provide a bit of a different approach. The archive page also serves as an interesting chronological history of the past year.
Archaeo-blogology
In fact, after that first post in April… I didn’t write another that month. I didn’t even write one in May. During that month I was working hard on both Virtual Southside as well as my first shot at social media for an actual course I teach. June, my most prolific month, was the result of using the blog to fulfill the requirements of a really lame online grad course on “educational technology.” Truly the worst course I have ever experienced. You can easily tell this by the lame posts and lame books and movies and edtech articles from five and ten years ago. Jeeeez. I wish I hadn’t looked back over those just now.
Things got much better when school started and I began to feel a true mission for the blog. When November began, I followed along with Steve Dembo in his 30 Days to Being a Better Blogger adventure. That experienced helped tremendously. Also in November, I was actually even nominated for a 2008 Edublogs Award. You can imagine my surprise as such a green little blogger, but that was no doubt extrinsically empowering. I am certain to post several more reflective pieces on things I have experienced, learned and accomplished over the past year. Stay tuned for those. As soon as my grad program is completed in May… I have a lot of things to explore yet. Grad school, a new baby girl… it’s a wonder I could pull off any of this at all.
To community
Most of all- thank you. Thanks for coming here. Thanks for reading. Thanks for commenting. Thanks for joining in the discussion. Thank you for helping to steer my personal learning mission over the past year. I cannot thank each and every one of you enough. The thinking I do about the things you say… is worth a graduate course in something each time. In reflection over this past year, I can for certain that the biggest thing I have gained from blogging is people. I now have current and future collaborators on from all over the country. We have and will collaborate on projects that will no doubt extend not only my learning, but that of my friends and colleagues in Saint Joseph. I am humbled by the professionalism, creativity, and generosity of people in this newly-generated community. Thanks isn’t enough.
My Sunday morning started with these words from Walt Whitman:
GOING SOMEWHERE
My science-friend, my noblest woman-friend,
(Now buried in an English grave–and this a memory-leaf for her dear sake,)
Ended our talk–”The sum, concluding all we know of old or modern
learning, intuitions deep,
“Of all Geologies–Histories–of all Astronomy–of Evolution,
Metaphysics all,
“Is, that we all are onward, onward, speeding slowly, surely bettering,
“Life, life an endless march, an endless army, (no halt, but it is
duly over,)
“The world, the race, the soul–in space and time the universes,
“All bound as is befitting each–all surely going somewhere.”
…long, organic, rhythmic free verse. Ahhh…
Back in September I wrote a post about an interesting little web service called DailyLit. I had just signed up and received the first of 423 installments of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass via email. I spoke of how you could integrate small chunks of text like this into your school’s literacy program. Given that from age 14 to 18, and from AP Physics to PE, we read for different reasons and in different ways. For these reasons, I saw this service as an interesting and free way to add rich sources of text for classroom analysis, or even simply for volume or pleasure. As of today, it is the “pleasure principle” that made me check back in on this web entity.
Fast-forward to today’s email (you can also choose RSS) which contained installments 368 and 369 from Leaves of Grass. Grounding. Things like this can help to keep my head in check. I love it when the wisdom of brilliant and creative people from ages gone by is held up to the present for inspection, reflection- and in this case: inspiration. And by the way… which “Evolution” is he speaking of here? His capital “E” puts it on level with Geologies, Histories, Astronomy, and Metaphysics. Thus, in my mind, he speaks of Darwin’s fresh theory of biological evolution.
So this led me to a quick inquiry. What year again was Leaves of Grass first published? A quick check returns 1855. Now, I remembered reading about how Whitman constantly revised his works again and again. However, one only need know that the publication of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species was in 1859, to want to question this text a bit more. So apparently, between the first edition of Leaves in 1855, and the final in 1882, he changed not only verse and style… but content. I now have something to research for myself. Find the text from 1855. Do a comparison. I wonder what I will find. I wonder if any of you feel like helping me out in this endeavor. (?) Did I ever notice this date interplay prior to blogging about this poem today? No. No I didn’t.
Chalk up another win for the synthesis found within the act of blogging. I love it. I love what it does to my brain.
As I sat down to tap out the post this evening, I realized something really cool. What began as a rather humble re-blogging of a famous work of art from the 1800’s, has led to me evaluating text, inferring intent, and questioning context. Hmmm… I wonder if these are behaviors we seek to foster in our students. I wonder if blogging can help deliver this. In reality, this wonder contains less doubt and more certainty than it did less than a year ago for me.
So I leave you with installment #369 for your evening of March 22nd, 2009. God, I love these words:
SMALL THE THEME OF MY CHANT
Small the theme of my Chant, yet the greatest–namely, One’s-Self–
a simple, separate person. That, for the use of the New World, I sing.
Man’s physiology complete, from top to toe, I sing. Not physiognomy alone,
nor brain alone, is worthy for the Muse;–I say the Form complete
is worthier far. The Female equally with the Male, I sing.
Nor cease at the theme of One’s-Self. I speak the word of the
modern, the word En-Masse.
My Days I sing, and the Lands–with interstice I knew of hapless War.
(O friend, whoe’er you are, at last arriving hither to commence, I
feel through every leaf the pressure of your hand, which I return.
And thus upon our journey, footing the road, and more than once, and
link’d together let us go.)
“OK Sean, I am ready to start reading some blogs. Can you tell me where to start… give me a few places to begin?”
Connecting
The above question is one I have begun fielding more and more often from faculty members as of late. Many teachers at Benton, and a growing number from other schools in town are ready to start tapping this powerful resource. In my opinion, this is a fantastic way to begin. Read. Read. Read. The best way to understand blogs is to read them.
The second step in the process is usually making your mark publicly and actually commenting on a few blogs that stir your interest. This is a very important move because it is the step that actually defines you as a contributor. This is no small thing, for this is a contribution to what has become a vibrant and global conversation.
For some, the final step in joining this conversation is to set up a blog, which is a place to guide a community of conversation of your own. Sure, some folks will say that they blog “for reflection”, or to “sort out their thoughts”, or even to “create an archive of what is happening in my life or work.” To this, I agree completely.
My perspective
Blogging fulfills many of those things for me as well. However, if that was all I really wanted to do, I certainly wouldn’t need to go to the Internet for it- much less do it in global public spaces. I would simply download one of the available free journal applications… or just tap away at MS Word. Right? Okay, perhaps Pages for me… but you get the point.
For me, the act of blogging has been responsible for more synthesis of thought than I have experienced in a really long time. For me, this is not only a place to put together professional thoughts, life experiences, and opinions, it changes the way I experience things. I find that I am now engaged in the act of “blogging” even while away from my laptop during most waking hours (and likely a few while asleep). I have always composed in my head, and this exercise makes it happen often. That said, for me personally, it is also very much about the interaction with those who reply to, link to, or blog about the ideas that I present there. That interaction between interested people from many countries not only changes the conversation after I post to the blog, but it also affects my future writing as I once again consider the audience that unfolds there.
So, where do I tell folks who ask where to look? The first place I suggest looking is down the right-side column of my blog under the header “blogroll.” This is a list of bloggers who, for differing reasons, have compelled me to plaster a permanent link from my site to theirs. Looking through someone’s blogroll is akin to mining the bibliography of a really super journal article. My blogroll is my “go to” list when I get a hour to read. How did I find those names in the first place? The answer to that question is as diverse as is the list.
However, more and more I realized that before you fill up Google Reader with a ton of blogs you may or may not read later on, there might be a better place to begin. And really… if you are just starting to open up to blogs as a learning resource, you probably aren’t ready to mess with RSS just yet. I really do like Alltop. I still use it. I came pretty close to titling this post: ”RSS for the masses.” When I want a visual version of the latest posts from the best blogs, I scan the screen there and click at will. In the words of Alltop, their service “is an ‘online magazine rack’ of popular topics. We update the stories every hour. Pick a topic by searching, news category, or name, and we’ll deliver it to you 24 x 7.” There is also a nice little explanatory video linked near the top of the main page.
In fact, just this past week, Alltop has now added a feature called “My Alltop.” As you can probably guess, this is a user-customized screen showing only the latest posts of the blogs you choose from all categories. I created my personal page the day it went live, and it bookmarks tons of blogs on the topics of education, science, neuroscience, literacy, news and even a few humor and “being a daddy” -type blogs. To me, it feels like something between that of a beefed-up blogroll and an aggregator. Another cool feature is that you can share the URL to your personal page with others.
In fact, as of a couple of months ago, you can also find my nascent little blog there.
The day my link first appeared on the site, I received a message that invited me to go to Alltop and download a badge to adorn the blog. I’m not above badges. Badges are fun. Steeenking badges. The one you see just above is the one you’ll see in the right sidebar of my blog. However, if public education wasn’t my business of choice, I might have been inclined to choose the more playful one shown modified below:
Add Alltop Education to your bookmarks toolbar. Click when you have a slot of time that couldn’t dare handle the latest print release by ASCD, but certainly could slide in a blog or two. Oh and of course, look for me there:
Oh yeah… I almost forgot: My name is Sean, and I approve this message.
Tell me this isn’t good. I am inspired by the performance here as well as the coaching that led to a kid being empowered to this type of creation. Think this isn’t synthesis?
Lyrics: People get malaria when they’re bit by a mosquito
It’s taking lives like a torpedo
Every year one million die worldwide
But you can prevent it with insecticide
Maybe a breakthrough cure for malaria
To starve the parasite was their idea
Every thirty seconds a child dies
Without treatment, it’s no surprise
A family in Africa could be saved by a bug net
Too bad they can’t afford one yet
This treatment fights the drug-resistant kind
Hopefully we can put malaria out of mind
I wish this cure will help people everywhere
I want it to end their nightmare
Understandably, I often field comments like: “I just need to see what technology integration looks like.” Well, I would say this is a nice little example of a student taking a piece of content and exploding it into not only a scientific and artistic expression… but ultimately what may just move across the plane of classroom into social action. And to me, that is golden. This blog post and video are certainly not about the technology, but rather facilitated by it. To think that you can sit in front of a camera, and then a computer and create rich content like this to demonstrate learning is very cool. Though to think your response could actually move folks to action is, well… nothing short of inspiring.
The video is just a part of a really nice blog post that provides some nice context for the song. You really need to visit this link to get the full experience. Shoot- perhaps Miss Jennifer needs her own YouTube channel to publish future scientific songstress expressions?
This post was made by a student of Stacy Baker’s biology class. Stacy is one a handful of my Twitter friends who helps to keep The Synapse running along with Erin & I. Her class blog was most-deservedly voted “Best Class Blog” in the 2008 Edublogs Awards.
I am pretty excited to see all of the chatter about this post in such a short time (as I hope Jennifer is). You never know where these things will go. So what do you get out of this? What does it make you think? Is this to be valued as highly as I value it? Am I wrong in thinking so? I would love your feedback.
I’m asking for your help. If you could pick anyone, anything, or anyplace, What books would you read? What conferences, workshops, or meetings would you attend? Who would you travel to meet with? Who would you fly in to sit at the table with you? Who would you pick to help you in your strategic brainstorming or planning? Who could help inject progressive, innovative ideas about the future of education and the technologies that will drive it? Anyone. Yes, I am serious.
This post is a straightforward attempt to leverage the power of my PLN. It is my goal to get some fresh input about that very thing… fresh input. As a generalist instructional coach on what could realistically be called a “21st Century upgrade” mission in my building, I have spent countless hours in research this past year. In fact, this blog originated from some of my earliest explorations into how a school can systematically raise the tech literacy of its staff ahead of a larger edtech implementation with students.
Here’s the deal
I am pleased to say that I work in a district with some success in incubating innovation. We locally help to fund innovation with a fantastic “Apple Seed” grant program for creative projects. We also celebrate ingenuity with an “Innovator of the Year” award- presented alongside the T.O.Y. award each year. On a district wide level, our administrators in charge of curriculum & instruction are working hard to implement constructivist-leaning instruction and content-specific best practices.
In my opinion, we have long lacked such a mandated, district level approach to educational technology integration. We invested early in a robust and speedy system-wide fiber optic network. We have always succeeded in putting current, state of the art technological tools in the hands of our children. What we now recognize the need for, is an innovative and comprehensive plan to elevate the technological savvy of all SJSD faculty members. 21st Century literacy skills (whatever you think those might be) cannot be developed in our children by skipping over our staff to do so. We are ready to do the staff development required in readying our own workforce… to ready those of the future.
Our crew
A district task force was assembled to study the situation. Our group consists of three instructional coaches, one social studies teacher, a library/media specialist, our district’s technology curriculum specialist, and our chief operating officer. We have been told that we are “taking one year to study.” One year to learn everything we can about what the future of learning will look like- at least with regard to information and communication technologies. Experimentation with free online technologies has been spawned and is growing in a grassroots way in a few places already. My home high school actually has a building-wide implementation plan that was put into play this past summer.
The goal is to get just enough perspective about what we are currently doing… and what we still need to do… before making any more large scale technology purchases. The idea is to put the “buy it and they will come” -approach to edtech integration to bed for good. This task force is headed by our C.O.O. He is a direct sitting member of our superintendent’s council. This level of buy-in is aligned what I had in mind when I wrote a post entitled “Increasing Our Level of Vitamin A” last November. We are really to the point in our little corner of the world where we need to think long and hard about our mission and vision prior to buying even one more laptop. Smart move, methinks. And this mission had better be flexible. Life moves pretty fast in these circles.
Why should you care?
I don’t know if I can say why you should care about a project in Missouri. However, I do believe I know why you will. Because you are a bunch of committed, forward-thinking educators. Folks like us know the power of buy-in at all levels of implementation. Here’s betting that the readers of this blog realize the power potential of solid know-how combined with administrative support.
Please help. I could submit my own recommendations. I essentially do that quite regularly behind the driver’s seat of this blog. The articles I write examine interesting avenues and advocate passionate positions. My blogroll is a list of folks I rely on for new learning. I have a set of books on my shelf that were important to me, but really… the elements of my learning network allow it to be a dynamic, hyper-responsive, thing. There is even a pretty good chance you came here from the Twitterverse- and that has become a frighteningly good resources as of late.
We are locked and loaded for NECC 2009. We are set for a sit-down at 1 Infinite Loop in Cupertino this March. We recently sent a small contingent to METC 2009 for a last minute look at a few of the presenters. We are ready to grab a few keystone texts for the group to dive into. We are ready to visit the top workshops available where our learning/time ratio will be strongest.
We are going to take a slow, smart, focused look at this issue. I can make informed suggestions as it is. Yet- this post marks one of the ways I am increasingly gaining input. Here’s betting that an emerging best practice in “informed decision making” includes surveying your PLN as an crucial step. What do you say… will you make a suggestion for our study?
Before I roll out the details of this little mini-project, allow me to summarize. This project was the first of many in an attempt to characterize the differences between online writing and more traditional formats. Students in my Dual-Credit Biology course were divided into two groups upon culmination of a biochemistry unit. Half of the class wrote a comprehensive unit summary in a traditional format which was turned in directly to the teacher. The other half of the class composed a summary in an online forum for a much wider audience (Ning network).
Summaries were analyzed for word count, readability and effect on content-based exam scores. Exam scores and readability were closely aligned. However, strong differences were noted in average word count. Students writing in online forums used significantly fewer words to achieve the same overall impact. Implications of using online forums for future enhancement of student summarization are discussed. My take? Writing online is a potentially powerful tool for summarization of course content.
The set-up
A building-wide focus for instructional improvement in my high school this year, has been to launch and maintain an instructional technology integration initiative. The school year began with a cohort of twenty teachers who were willing to engage in training above and beyond the professional development for all staff. I began meeting with these teachers in mid-June for three-hour technology training sessions. The first meeting consisted of a “care and feeding” session for the 15″ MacBook Pros, Olympus digital cameras and iPod nanos the cohort teachers received. From that session forward, training sessions integrated this hardware, as well as emerging online technologies, with solid instructional best practices for classroom learning. These twenty teachers have followed a prescription of immersion. New technological tools were presented alongside potential uses in a classroom setting. An online social network was set up to facilitate learning between face-to-face meetings.
I teach one course during the regular school day. Principles of Biology is a course in which students earn 101-level college credit through Missouri Western State University. This course is populated by students who enjoy learning. Work conducted by these students formed the basis of comparison in this study. Our course network is also based on the Ning platform. Though this network features discussion forums as well as blogs, both are examples of online writing in some form or other. As you will see, in this class, I utilize the forum much more than the blog. This will certainly have an effect on the results of this project.
The main event
What effects, if any, does a move toward online writing generate? Actually, little has been done to characterize the impact this new “genre” of writing is having on student achievement. In fact, blogging has been said to be different enough as to warrant a new genre of writing called “connective writing.” As Will Richardson has said: it is
“…a form that forces those who do it to read carefully and critically, that demands clarity and cogency in its construction, that is done for a wide audience, and that links to the sources of the ideas expressed.”
This project began at the culmination of a biochemistry and nutrition unit. Class sessions throughout were widely varied and ranged from cooperative work in small groups, guided webquests, lecture and discussion, and wet-lab investigations. The final strategy prior to the unit exam was to have students engage in writing a comprehensive summary of their learning throughout the unit. Students were randomly divided into two groups. They were then informed that they would be doing one of two types of comprehensive summary.
The only difference between the two groups of students was writing “environment.” The “odd” group was to compose the summary on a word processor, and then print as well as e-mail the final copy directly to the instructor only. The “even” group was to write their summary online, as a blog post, to our classroom network. Based on previous work with the online class network, these students knew that their work would be accessible online to virtually anyone. This group of students knew that they were writing for a potentially wide audience, while the students of the first group were writing for me alone. Since this class is largely an inquiry-based biology class, data was analyzed by the students themselves. Students were asked to infer from the data and make conclusions online based on the findings.
So what happened?
Overall, 20 students participated in the study- out of a total of 20 enrolled in the class. Each student in the table is listed only by initials in order to preserve anonymity. (Table 1) Students who constructed a comprehensive summary of nutrition unit via online blog post for a wide and potentially global audience (even group):
(Table 2) Students who constructed comprehensive summary of nutrition unit via MS Word document handed in directly to teacher (odd group):
An examination of the data will show average exam scores differed less than one-half of a point across the two groups. Average readability was also comparable, with the average score differing less than one Flesch-Kincaid grade level. Easily the largest difference between the two groups was the average number of words used per summary. Students writing online summaries used an average of 239 words less (399 opposed to 638) than those writing in Microsoft Word for me alone. Variability in all data seemed fairly low for human studies. Word counts were tightly clustered around the mean for online writers. Though the results here seem fairly simple to interpret, there are many factors that must be considered in any analysis and subsequent application.
Jibba-Jabba
In this study, students were instructed to create a comprehensive summary of a unit on biochemistry. The only instructions given were that the summary should provide an understandable context for the main topics of study, and that any source used should be cited. It was also suggested to students that the mere creation of this summary would help to prepare for the upcoming exam. Therefore, the only difference between the groups would truly be whether the summary was composed in an online forum or in a word processor. Also- the online group knew their summary would gain a potentially global audience while the MS Word group knew that their summary would be read only by me.
Before extrapolating too far, it is important to note that when planning to implement any new teaching strategy, the first consideration should be to do no harm. With that philosophy in mind, the data in this study immediately suggests that when students worked online, they certainly performed no worse than their counterparts who spent their time offline.
With that in mind, the fact that both groups showed no measurable difference in exam scores, is encouraging. Therefore, even if an instructor wanted to use online writing as nothing more than a novel approach that might excite a few reluctant learners, they would likely do no harm toward content achievement. I had initially hypothesized that due to the connective nature of this form of writing, students would better assimilate the content of the unit and show higher exam scores. When considering this initial study alone, that hypothesis was not supported. Though it is also important to note that the individual classroom climate and culture could impact these results heavily. Not only would the feel of a classroom influence these results, it is easy to see how previous instruction could change things to a large degree.
To this point, few significant differences have been shown between the two study groups. However, when looking at raw word count per summary, things quickly diverge. It was anticipated that the group engaging in online writing would be stimulated to write a higher volume of words. Hey- it’s a novel approach. Writing online is in contrast to a traditional approach where the work is done in isolation from start to finish. In fact, this is the opposite result seen in the trial. The group writing online submitted a much lower word count (avg. = 399) than the word processing group (avg. = 638). This is no small difference and would certainly register as significant on any statistical test.
Why so many fewer words per summary when writing online? Many of the participants had an idea about this when analyzing the results after the fact. The following statement by student “RH” typifies a common student response:
“It appeared that the papers had a higher readability and word count, which I kind of expected because I think people tend to write more formally on papers, whereas the blog posts tend to be more opinion and informal writing.”
The aspect of formality is something that was not considered to be a factor prior to the study, and yet it makes solid sense. The type of online writing these students had engaged in prior to this study was largely of a reflective nature. Our work online has tended to center around written reflections that helped to synthesize classroom sessions. A more formal approach to blogging has simply not been utilized as of yet with this class. This is something that could certainly affect the results of this study. Online writing has been approached in many ways for many different reasons in classrooms across our building this year. It is very interesting to think about furthering this study to investigate the details of this interaction between instruction and writing.
First phase data is soon due in from three other participating teachers. In contrast with the class in this study, several of the other participating classes feature some “reluctant” learners. It will be interesting to see if the results of those trials differ from these in any way. I would guess that they will. The analysis of this new data, will certainly provide a jumping off point for the next round of research in our school.
Wheww… finally
To conclude, this brief study demonstrated several things. For one, the mere act of writing of a comprehensive summary prior to a unit exam seems to be an effective strategy for a class of mature high school students. Furthermore, the nature of this summary did little to affect scores in this study. Students writing in online forums showed an average score almost exactly equal to that of students writing in a more traditional (printed) format.
The most signficant result of this study was the analysis of word count between the study groups. Students writing online submitted significantly more concise summaries with smaller word counts. The implications of this data are very interesting. Furthermore, students who wrote less (when writing online) performed equal to those students who wrote many more words. This could directly point to the power of online writing in helping students to summarize effectively. This is no small feat considering the difficulty many of today’s students tend to have with summarization. Hotshot ASCD guru, Robert Marzano, makes the case that “summarization has a robust and long history of research,” and is one of the “nine most effective instructional strategies a teacher can employ.” These final results will likely have implications for not only future research trials at our high school, but for immediate classroom action in the area of content summary writing.
You?
What do you think about writing online? You obviously read online. You likely even write online. We would love feedback about what goes on in your mind when you write online in different settings. What happens when you blog? How are discussion forums different? What difference does a global audience make- if any? Weigh in. What does change when you write online?
Snow falls. My fireplace coats one half of me in cozy radiance. Across the room, Erin animates a book for my curious babe. School is still a solid day and a half away. As I sit here inspired by the art of Vladislav Gerasimov’s studio, I ponder physical space.
I catch myself in full muse about the spaces in which I usually write and how they might influence tone, mood, volume, and mission. Of course, I am sometimes sitting in my office at 3:00pm pecking keys that reflect the day. Other times still, I am stuck to a conference hall wall -hugging an outlet- allowing my laptop to drink while I scribble electronically.
Though given my choice, it would look much like today. The mission-inspired rocker where my butt is planted- was meant for a nursing mother just two years ago. Since this chair didn’t seem to inspire her “mission” after all, it has lately become my writing chair. Her lack of love for this spot has become my pirate’s loot. Here I sit feet up -gliding in the golden glow of flames- tapping on letters for fun.
The more serious posts in waiting: our school’s use of the Ning platform, tech strategies for increasing writing fluency, etc… well, they’ll just have to wait.
Actually, there is a plenty about our artistic stick blogger friend that doesn’t concretely resemble me. My head isn’t that big, I’m not a big fan of Digg, and far more than letters fill my head. A conversation with my Communication Arts department the other day revealed a multitude of mental strategies for writing. Most seemed to rely heavily on a stepped-draft approach. I thought it interesting that my pal Kelly Lock and I both tend to compose in mental spaces before encoding onto the page. You can thus imagine the stress we felt while fabricating those incremental “rough draft” assignments in high school. I bet the little fella above would create his “outline” assignment after-the-fact as well.
Come to think of it, there might be many similarities between he and I. He does have a slender build. He does lean intently into his superthin laptop. He does love dim lighting, and his silly feet seem to be less than planted on terra firma at times. Hey, you can’t always be practical, right?
So where do you write? Not when you have to… but when you can. What is there with you? Where does it take place when you get to choose? Tell it. Draw it. Photograph it. Blog it. Come back and share it. You know you want to.
ps- If you care that your screen is beautiful and creative, then check out the art at Vlad Studio. With the Holiday season fast approaching, I think Christmas Volcano is my current fave. Wow. No one on Earth would care enough to pay for an ad on this site, so consider this merely a nod in a cool direction. Image above is entitled: Blogger (digg it digg it digg it).
Day two of the Dembo assignment is a fun one. As a relatively nascent blogger, gathering data on the traffic to and from my blog has been enlightening. That data is what this post is all about.
I started this blog in April. On August 22nd or so, I added the code for Google Analytics to this site, the tech PD site for my school, and my marine biology site. I have to say tracking the who, what, when and where of the visitors to my sites has been intriguing. It is almost addictive. I agree with Steve when he says, “…those graphs are good for the ego and can be highly motivating. For example, the days when I do post a new blog, I clearly see a bump in traffic, which is always incentive to post more often!”
Not only is proof that people really are connecting to your words validating, it is a fantastic teaching point. Since all of my students are now dipping their toes into the blogosphere, at least on our network sites, I periodically try to highlight interesting stats for them on the big screen. What would be the main point here? Connectedness. One of the main reasons for participating in blogging is the building of collective intelligence. This is the key element of Web 2.0. This is why the read/write web has and is changing the face of communication and of education in bright little pockets all over the globe. For people generally unfamiliar with blogs- these connections make an impact. I spoke of this briefly in an earlier post on blogging.
Writing and sharing to a wide audience is huge. A few colleagues and I are about to embark on an action research project to examine the effects of writing online compared to merely hitting “print” and walking your words to your teacher. In recent discussions, we have talked in depth about the differences we see in our student work when interacting online. We think we see increased volume, engagement, creativity and even a stronger “tuning in” to the elements of our specific content. Therefore, we are going to attempt a study to examine these effects across several disciplines. If nothing else, we will certainly be better able to characterize what is going on with our students as we move more of what we do onto the transparency of the web.
So, on to the “assignment” at hand. This one was easy for me, since I realized the value of this far before I actually added analytic capability to my site. However, reading the assignment today reminded me of a few of the stats I had forgotten to check for some time.
I took several screenshots within my analytics page and posted them to my Flickr account. I will post a few of them inline now, but the rest can be viewed here. As a scientist by training, trust this: this much data tends to make me a bit giddy. Wow. To start, a 30,000ft view of the traffic pattern to my blog:
As you can see here, when you start any blog, the traffic is quite light. It is also quite clear to see the bumps I get each time log a new post now. The really cool thing to me is that the trend shows that there are consistently more people reading those posts as time goes on. This is a good sign that I’m not making folks too terribly upset. Or perhaps… I am. Interesting thought. It is cool to think of 198 absolute unique visitors in just the past couple of months. That is encouraging to any blogger and is certainly an impetus to keep on posting.
The chart above was clipped from the tech cohort blog I set up called Virtual Soutside. This provides a look at the difference when you have twenty people contributing to a site. Also, instead of a mere three months of visits, I have been tracking this site since June of 2008.
Other assorted facts gleaned from the analysis of this blog to date include:
Over 60% of the traffic here now comes from referring sites. These are essentially, other sites that link to my blog. Some of these are controlled by me, such as posting a link to my Twitter peeps. Some are controlled by folks posting an outbound link to nashworld on their site.
My readers are from eleven different countries. (14 as of the next morning) The vast majority are from the United States, but others are from Malaysia, Kenya and India to name a few.
65% of my visitors view this site through the Firefox browser. That happens to be my personal browser of choice about 90% of the time as well. There are times when I fire up Safari as well. They really do perform differently at times. Only 19% view nashworld via Internet Explorer. This make me strangely happy.
63% of you come to my blog powered by the Mac operating system. Wow. That is far more than I expected, even with our heavy usage of OSX in the district. Almost 3% of visitors now arrive here in the palm of their hand via iPhone, and one person actually found their way here from a Playstation 3.
The average visitor views 2.6 pages here. This surprised me as well. I thought that number would be far smaller. The way I have the blog set up now, a visitor arriving via the main page can actually read ten separate posts without even clicking another link. This is also encouraging to me.
Speaking well to the power of smart referrals, the average time spent on any given visit is far higher when you come from a link posted by another blogger. The really crazy stat is that the average time spent on the site by visitors arriving from Will Richardson’s blog, Weblogg-ed, is far higher than the rest. Those of you coming in from Weblogg-ed currently spend an average of nearly 15 minutes on the site as opposed to the four and a half minutes of all visitors. Hey Will, your readers have taste!
This is but a slice of the data available from Google Analytics. Even my Flickr set, with all of the screenshots I just referenced and a few more, is barely a fourth of what the site can reveal.
Also interesting is the visitor visualization on ClustrMaps. You can see this map over in the right sidebar of this page=> I just added this Widget to the blog abut a month ago. I don’t think it is as accurate as GA, and it is definitely not as comprehensive, but it sure is pretty, and gives your readers a slice of your data at a glance.
So to sum things up, I am two assignments down and 28 to go. I have a feeling that things will get rocky toward the end when our new little girlie is born, so I am buckling down for the near term. Also: I don’t know all of my readers, but I like them. They tend to be super-connected Mac snobs who read some other really smart blogs. They can also probably tell me some amazing things about these stats I haven’t yet noticed. By all means, please do respond with what you see in this data.
If you are local and would like some help setting up Google Analytics for your blog, you know who to ask. Right?
Artwork thanks:
Warby, William. “Traffic Light Tree.” warby’s photostream. 03 MAY 2008. Flickr.
2 Nov 2008 <http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2077/2460655511_779a1d1a5c.jpg?v=0>.
I now fully feel like I’m one of Tyler Durden’s minions from Fight Club. I’ll never forget the night Tyler (played by Brad Pitt) implored his followers to all go out and get in a fight with a total stranger… and of all things: lose. Watching a clip from the movie will tell you it wasn’t all that easy. Ok, wait. I’m not actually engaging in any sort of urban terrorism here. This is just blogging. Edu-blogging. Coaching from afar. Connecting. And today… telling folks about me. I wonder if Steve Dembo has ever thought of himself as Durden. Here’s me: betting that he hasn’t.
However, Mr. Dembo certainly is putting the edublogosphere, and anyone else who cares to read, on assignment. Today’s “assignment” comes as part one of thirty in the “Thirty Days to Being a Better Blogger” series. Now this is one ambitious task. I feel particularly giddy if I roll off more than one post in a week. And the assignment for day one: the “About” page. Seems simple enough. However, even though this page comes complete in nearly any readymade blog theme, few people capitalize on it. Reading today’s post at Teach42 made me a believer in the importance of this page in any blog.
“…when you get right down to it, the About page is absolutely critical to a blog. It provides visitors insight into who the author is, what they can expect to see on the blog, and what sort of lenses the information is being viewed through.” ~S.Dembo
So be sure to fix up your About page in the very near future. I would expect a few folks might even pay a bit more attention in the near future. Actually, when you think about it, you have likely already tapped this page on any blog I have pointed you toward already. Think about it. Have you? Be sure to check out the pages in the blogroll on the lower half of the right column here. They are all huge references for me. It might be good to scan a few of those to see how they let their readers know who and what they can expect to read there.
I do hope the next twenty-nine assignments stay as far away from the “Fight Club” list as possible… I’m way too out of shape for that kind of battle. Anyone care to play along here with me?
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