Just "Google" it?

A listserv that I belong to sent me a link referencing a study commissioned by the British Library.

The study is interesting, especially in its conclusions about the "Net Generation." For all the talk about the sophistication of our young people, and their supposed techno-savvy-ness, it seems that, like in many things, they need some instruction! (Go figure.)

Perhaps there is a role for teachers and teacher-librarians after all.
Here's a quote from the article published in "Library Journal".

• A new study commissioned by the British Library and JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee) says that the "Google Generation"—youth born or brought up in the Internet age—is not particularly web-literate, and their research traits—impatience in search and navigation and zero tolerance for any delay in satisfying their information needs—are becoming the norm for all age-groups.
  

I must say that this has been my experience working with students at the high school level. While many kids are avid users of IM and Facebook, and some are experienced gamers, when it comes to putting together a good search, they are often at a loss how to begin. (An Elementary level colleague recently reported the same thing!)

Instead of libraries being a thing of the past, maybe our work has just begun!

Bio Lit Crit

I just finished reading "Madame Bovary's Ovaries". The authors (Barash and Barash) lead the reader on a delightful journey through many of the classics of literature. The twist is that they approach each fictional character as if they were real people, driven by Darwinian imperatives. Why was Othello so jealous? Genes explain everything!

Open Source Textbooks

I was reading through some of my listserv messages today and I came across this post commenting on the "Open Textbook" movement.

"Imagine textbooks adapted to many learning styles and translated into myriad languages. (Today, language barriers prevent many immigrant parents from helping their children with their homework because the texts are only in English.) Imagine textbooks that are continually updated and corrected by a legion of contributors. (Today, Pluto remains in the list of planets in the nation's science textbooks, and who knows how long it will take for it to be removed.)" (Bringing open resources to textbooks and teaching.)

This made me think about the changing nature of "print" media in today's world. I was just reading an article by Illich (The Alphabetization of the Popular Mind.) for one of my classes. One of his points is that the permanent nature of print "fixes" ideas, songs, thinking in such a way as to freeze them in a moment in time. Some classical philosophers objected to writing because they saw it as a curse not a blessing. (This is ironic of course because it is thanks to writing that any of their ideas survive to the present day...but I digress.) What is interesting about the Open Textbook model is that "print" is no longer print in the same way. A published work can be adapted, modified, edited, clarified ad infinitum. Pluto is no longer a planet? Make the edit, and move on.

Choose? You choose!

I've been reading "The Paradox of Choice" by Barry Schwartz. (The link will let you read the first few pages of the book.) Right from the first page, I was hooked. Barry develops his thesis that, although we are conditioned to think more choice is better, in fact, it turns out that too much choice is a real impediment.

In particular, his concept of "satisficers" and "maximizers" makes so much sense. Our overwhelming number of choices can actually paralyze us! Fascinating reading.

Transliteracy - Reading 2.0?

For the new year, I suggest checking out "First Monday", a peer-reviewed journal on the Internet, about the Internet.

An article in the December 2007 issue ("Transliteracy: crossing divides.") discusses a new take on literacy which the authors define as “the ability to read, write and interact across a range of platforms, tools and media from signing and orality through handwriting, print, TV, radio and film, to digital social networks". There are some interesting implications for teachers, librarians and authors in this article.

I was also intrigued by what the authors refer to as a ‘transliterate lifeworld’. A lifeworld is described the fusion of one's physical environment and subjective experiences that make up an individual's everyday life. A perfect example is the intersection of the two worlds of cat and cat owner (same space, but different ways of using it), or the meaning of "my kitchen" to a chef on the one hand and a mechanic on the other. (Read the article!) It makes me wonder how the physical worlds I share with family, or colleagues, or students might in fact seem very different from my own lifeworld perspective.

For more on transliteracy, you can also check out this site.

CLACs Rule!

I just finished reading "The Story of French" by Nadeau and Barlow. This is a great book for francophiles and francophones, packed with all kinds of interesting details about the development of the French language and its continued existence today. It has quite an optimistic take on the future of the language as well, especially with the support it is being given by la Francophonie (despite our increasingly anglophonic world.)

Aside from all the other fascinating tidbits in the book, one particular section jumped out at me. Nadeau explains that "La Francophonie" has set up 213 CLACs around the world. These small libraries - CLACs (Centre de lecture et d'animation, in English they would be called a "Centre for Reading and Community Activity") - were inspired by Philippe Sauvageau, the head librarian of Quebec's National Assembly Library. His goal was to develop small libraries of 2,500 books that would also offer internet access, games, movie screening rooms and sound systems. As a result of his vision, 17 countries now have CLACs, each costing only 40,000 euros apiece.

What is exciting about the concept of a CLAC, is that it can be set up relatively cheaply, and it quickly becomes a hub of community life. According to Nadeau, the presence of a CLAC dramatically increases the literacy level in the area it serves. Quelle bonne idée!

What are you reading?

Are young adults reading? Are we doomed because all kids seem to be doing is Facebook and texting? As classes wind down (and students wind up) in the week before Christmas break, I've had a chance to circulate a bit and ask students what they are reading. I'm always a little surprised to discover that maybe things aren't as dire as I thought. Of course the Golden Compass is popular right now, but so is Eclipse, and the Time Traveler's Wife, and Dan Brown, and Oprah picks, and lots more!

I was even more gratified when I stumbled across the Cool Reads website. (It was recommended to me by another TL.) Developed for and by young adults, the site reviews books for 10 to 15 year old "set" . The reviews come from all over the world. It even lists star reviewers (those who have had at least 30 reviews featured on the site.) You can pick from a number of genres including suspense, biography, time travel, fantasy, romance, sci-fi, and war, among others. It's a great resource for teachers and students alike. What I really like is that students can post their own reviews.

If you want to know what kids are saying about books, and what titles they are reading, Cool Reads is the place to visit.

Plagiarism...whose problem is it anyway?

"Kids nowadays! They all just copy and paste! Why doesn't anyone talk about plagiarism?"
This is a problem at the 8-12 level (and probably K-7 as well). As the TL in my school, I have been asked to give workshops to classes on the evils of plagiarism (which I will happily do!). Rather than throw up our hands, we need to fine-tune our assignments so that students must come up with some original angle in order to meet the requirements of the course.

"How can you make it copy-paste-proof?" This is a constant refrain for me as I work with my colleagues. If an assignment asks Grade 8 students to research a country and report on its language, culture, government, history and economy, most students will simply cut and paste from Britannica.com. If, instead, students are asked to research the country in question, compare it to Canada and then make a case for "which country is the most desirable culturally speaking" or "if I were to move to this new country, would I be better or worse off than I am now. and why?", then the final project becomes a student's unique perspective that demonstrates his/her understanding of the research that was done for the course. And, the "answer" is not googlable. or copy-pastable!

Don't "Blink"!

I just finished reading "Blink!" by Malcolm Gladwell. Fascinating book. I was intrigued by the idea that snap decisions are not always bad decisions. As Gladwell says in the book, we've been taught that "haste makes waste" and "look before you leap", but we don't recognize our capacity for pulling together the many bits of crucial information at our disposal and deriving a competent and accurate assessment of the situation. In particular, I was interested in his remark that a two second clip of a teacher's performance can allow an observer to predict how "effective" the teacher will be rated by his/her students at the end of the semester. (Nalini Ambady) My connection to ID work is to wonder about the many steps we are asked to complete before we propose an instructional design solution. (learner analysis, structural analysis, etc.) Would a competent designer simply be able to "grok" the solution without explicitly going through all the preliminary steps? Hmmm.

Students Bringing their own Tech to School.

I'm still despairing about the General Purpose lab attached to my library. The teachers are running up against the "browser version" wall and can't access some of the great sites that are out there. (This is my sad little refrain.) However, I was encouraged by a link my son Nathan sent to me. The Eee PC is a compact laptop, with a flash "hard drive" that sells for around $350. It runs Linux and comes loaded with Open Source software, a microphone, a camera, wifi and memory card slots. Very cool idea. They're not gaming machines by any stretch of the imagination, but perfect for word processing and on-line research.

I'm finding that more and more of my students are coming to school with a laptop. At any one time, there is at least one laptop in the library, connected to the wireless network. And of course, their computers can run circles around anything we have at school. Just wait until Christmas...I've been telling any student who will listen that s/he should strongly hint for a laptop under the tree.

So, maybe I'll turn the computer lab into an espresso lounge...

The Perils of Web 2.0 and Lesson Design

Last week a teacher came to see me, quite excited about incorporating some of the new Web 2.0 tools into the classroom. Unfortunately, our General Purpose lab cannot run a new enough browser to use the new tools. This is not the first teacher to have hit this roadblock. Wikis, blogs, interactive spellchecking sites, web-based mind mapping (Mind Meister...very cool) and a host of other very useful resources...we can't use them in the lab.

In my ID course, one of my classmates raised four key factors for schools to consider. He called this an "adoptability assessment". Here are the areas:
1. Time
2. Reliability
3. Seamlessness
4. Expertise

Each of these points can be a deal breaker for a teacher trying to integrate technology into his/her instruction.

Time: Especially in senior examinable courses, teachers feel that they are on the "final exam" 100 yard dash. They feel that they can't take ANY time out to do anything that might slow the "content delivery" schedule. If there is a bit of a learning curve for the students (or the teacher), it might not be "worth it." This is also an issue with the limited amount of time any one teacher can access the general purpose lab in our school. It is so heavily booked that you are lucky if you can get 2 consecutive blocks!

Reliability: This is another key consideration. Teachers, unless truly infotech savvy, will throw up their hands if the lesson does not proceed as planned. (See "time" above) Compatibility issues (software and hardware), and school equipment that is hopelessly behind compared to what students have at home (our GP lab runs system 9.....ack) are all speedbumps. And an easy fix for a techie teacher might be an insurmountable hurdle for a neophyte.

Seamlessness: Sometimes pen and paper is the way to go! It's a great idea to use Inspiration software for webbing. But what might be a 15 minute, pen and paper activity could end up ended up taking a whole block....and that doesn't factor in additional time for fooling around, crashing, losing work, rebooting, and re-mapping.

Expertise (Gap): In my school, I am available most of the time to pop in to the general purpose lab and troubleshoot...I am often asked to do this for teachers trying out a new idea. I am happy to help....it might be a simple printing problem, it may be that the site will not load (some hate Explorer, some hate Netscape...our lab won't run Firefox)...it might be that the great site that worked at home will simply not load. Ooops, there goes the lesson!

These factors may not seem "important" from an ID standpoint, but if we are designing lessons and units for real teachers to use with real students in real but usually sub-industry-standard labs, then they are very real issues.

On a related note:
Here's an interesting link to Steve Hargadon's blog that discusses this issue in a related way.
(Although I'm not sure agree with his "brain wiring" statement.) And he links to the Classroom 2.0 site that is looking for ways to help teachers do more with the technology! Take a look.

Check this out:
Also, Bubbl.us is an easy web based mind mapping tool...

The Blended Librarian?

As I was reading Chapter three of the Instructional Design text, it struck me that this process (ie. analyzing the learning context) is what teacher-librarians are exhorted to do as an element of the CPPT (Cooperative Program Planning and Teaching) part of their job.

When teachers come to the library to plan a unit or "flesh out" an existing project with the TL, the librarian often uses some kind of planning form that covers very nicely the "Before" "During" and "After" recommendations listed at the end of the chapter. p 52 (See link for a sample TL form here. PDF)

Instructional Designers come in many shapes and disguises! Interesting to think that this might be a "trendy title" that teacher-librarians should add to their resume! (See Blended Librarians link. ) Although this link points to an academic librarian context, I think it fits perfectly with what high school librarians need to be doing... and many already are.

This is Your Brain on Music

I'm reading this fascinating book called "This is Your Brain On Music." by Daniel Levitin. In his introduction, Dr. Levitin says some very profound things about the nature of sound. What I found particularly intriguing was his notion the scientists and artists are very much alike. They both engage in work that begins with a brainstorming or creative stage, followed by testing and refining in ways that involve the application of set procedures. Artists' studios and scientists' laboratories are also similar, with many projects on the go, using specialized tools and skills, and the final product is subject to interpretation. Both work in the pursuit of truth, but a truth is often contextual and changeable. Levitin posits that "today's truths become tomorrow's disproven hypotheses or forgotten objets d'art". He goes on to reference Piaget, Freud and Skinner as researchers whose theories have been overturned or re-evaluated and he talks about the goal of conveying "truth for now." This sounds similar to what I've been reading in my Instructional Design course, in particular, the information about situative and cognitive epistemologies of learning. Sounds like "eclectic constructivism" to me!

(Check out the book's website!)

Knowing as Distributed in the World.

Just finished reading the latest handout "Cognition and Learning", by Greeno, Collins and Resnick. Phew! Quite dense.

One section that resonated for me appeared earlier in the article, under title "Knowing as Distributed in the World." (For another interesting article on this idea, read this. [pdf])

I think "distributed knowledge" has ramifications for how we see groups or teams working and learning together. If intelligence and knowledge is situationally located, this may explain why some groups of students (or workers, in a business context) work extremely well together, and may be more productive than another similarly constituted group. The consequences of "mixing up" a group, or changing the membership randomly (and/or often) might be poor team and individual performances. A Distributed Knowledge perspective might give us some insight into why this might happen.

Reading this section also makes me think of how we often structure both learning environments and assessment practices, particularly in high school. We used to seat students in rows, ask them to take individual notes, and discourage "chit-chat". Recently, we have been moving towards encouraging "think-pair-share", studying with a partner, and working in cooperative learning groups. Ironic that we still test students as individuals, without access to any of the tools, artifacts or books, or the communities and practices that surrounded them in their learning environment. Hmmm.

In the "real" world (teachers always say this, what does it really mean?) individuals often access the knowledge that is distributed across an office setting, asking co-workers or consulting various information sources (manuals, web, notes) without having to hold "the sum of all knowledge" in his/her head.


Thought-provoking.

(For another article, read this. [pdf])
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Interesting mention of "situated learning" on a New York School District webpage.

New Technologies, Old style Teaching

What do we do with all the new technology that students have access to? This may be one of the key areas that Instructional Designers may be overlooking. Teachers and other instructors have a tendency to believe that new technologies simply offer a "new" way to do "the same old thing". (Larry Cuban comes to this conclusion after interviewing many secondary and post-secondary instructors for his book "Oversold and Underused".) When I think of my experience interacting with students at the high school level, (I am a high school teacher librarian) I see that technology and the students' adoption of social networking applications and their embracing of digital content and authoring has placed them in a different reality than that of most of their teachers. Designing learning environments for these students that do not factor in this new reality will fall short of the students' expectations. (This thinking is a reflection of the "Digital Native/ Digital Immigrant"[pdf download] (Prensky 2001) paradigm that is much discussed in K-12 circles these days.) For more on this, read a recent article by Prensky on the ASCD site.

Lots more by Marc here.