School 2.0

As SLA continues to take our steps into a more transparent form of schooling, two more SLA teachers have begun blogging. So be sure to check out the blog entries from Biochemistry teacher Gamal Sherif and Learning Specialist Anissa Weinraub.

A few weeks ago, Will Richardson asked us, "Can a school reasonably expect its students to blog if the teachers are not willing to join them in the effort?" And I think it's a good, hard question. The easy way out is to say that the kind of blogging we're asking students to do right now, answers to prompts, posting of work, etc... is not the same as the kind of blogging we talk about when we talk about the edublogosphere where teachers are reflecting on practice, thinking about big ideas, etc...

But that's only the easy answer. After all, we are asking students to reflect publicly about the way they learn. So is there an expectation that teachers would do the same?

I think the answer is yes, but a qualified yes. In a perfect world, all SLA teachers would be blogging about their experiences this year. I know I'd love to see it, if only because it's been such an incredible experience so far, and I'd love to see even more of it documented. I don't know if the entire world would want to read every entry, but I'm sure our students and parents would read a great many of them. But blogging as a teacher does require not only a willingness to be open about practice and pedagogy, but a willingness to step lightly around the issues that define our schools. Every educational blogger I know has some version of the Things We Can't Blog About post either in their head or on their blog. Finding that voice, that space, to be an edu-blogger isn't easy, and it's not something that I think a principal can or should mandate. I hope I model what good edu-blogging looks like for my teachers, and I do think that more and more SLA teachers will find blogging to be a powerful form of reflective practice that enhances their teaching. But for some reason, as much as I'm o.k. with creating assignments for students to all blog, I'm not comfortable asking that of my teachers.

Is that hypocritical? Fair? Should all SLA teachers blog? Or is it better to create the environment where it's o.k. for teachers to blog rather than expected?



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For all those folks who work in districts that block YouTube or GoogleVideo and therefore have been frustrated when they haven't been able bring that amazing video into the classroom, here's a post from Hackszine.com on how to download GoogleVideo and YouTube to your computer.

I'm excited about this in the short-term because it'll allow me to show the Web 2.0 video to students... but in the long term, I'm wondering about this.

On the one hand, this is good because it allows teachers and administrators to bring the content they view appropriate into the classroom. Now, anyone in charge of filtering can say, "Just download the video and bring it in... we trust your judgment to bring content into the classroom, but now we don't have to worry that the kids can view any of the inappropriate stuff on YouTube."

That seems like a good thing, prima facie. It's exactly the kind of hack that a lot of policy-makers would probably love. But I'm not sure it's a good thing because it sidesteps the larger question of how we, both as schools and as citizens, deal with the growing amount of information and content in the world. It feels like a 1995 solution to a 2007 problem. We need to teach kids how to make sense of more than just the content we present them with. We need them to make informed, intelligent decisions about what is and isn't appropriate, what is and isn't academic, what is and isn't true. YouTube is a growing source of information, entertainment and culture in our society... it's a bit of a muddled mess, and on a lot of levels, it is therefore the perfect place to ask a lot of these questions. But most of our schools can't even entertain that question because the site is blocked.

So yes, I'll use this hack, and I'll encourage SLA teachers and students to use this hack when they find content that they feel belongs in our classes, but I think it's a short-term patch to a much larger, much more interesting, much more troubling and much more thoughtful question.

What would a social networking notetaking tool look like?

If my "social network" are my classmates, what would happen if, every class, the notes I took as a student... the notes I made as a teacher... were published and shareable?

Useful?
Shared meaning?
Information overload?

What would that tool look like? Does it exist? Is it useful? Useless? Something in between?

There's a sense that the conversations around School 2.0 is beginning to come together. Whether it's Karl Fisch's 2020 Vision video, Chris Sessum's recent writings,, Steve Hargadon's recent interviews, Christian Long's Manifesto, David and Will's work or even some of the writing I've been doing lately, people are starting to attempt to wrap their heads around School 2.0.

More to the point, there's a movement afoot to use this moment in time to reimagine schools in powerful, progressive, transparent ways. Call it a Cluetrain Manifesto or call it the moment in time when a group of educators attempted to start the Reformation, it's an exciting moment. Go read the posts linked above (especially Chris Sessum's and Karl's video if you haven't seen it.) You probably won't agree with all of them, but hopefully there's a lot of stuff there to make us all think. Then go take part in the School 2.0 Manifesto Wikispace project.

The world has changed, can we build the schools that reflect that change and dare to help students to deal with the changes to come?

Ted Stevens (R-AK) has introduced Senate Bill 49 -- the Protecting Children in the 21st Century Act -- which Andy Carvin and others are calling DOPA Jr. The bill could have really profound effects on teachers, students and schools using Web 2.0 tools. I'm guessing that we'll see a fair amount of debate about it in the coming months, and the interpretations will be running fast and furious.

Andy Carvin has posted the first summary I've seen of the bill, and it's a must read. As he says, "Hang on to your hats, folks."

... don't screw up.

I spent today outside of Oregon, speaking to folks from four different school communities who are thinking about school reform. One of the towns just passed a bond that will allow them to rebuild their high school, and a day that many of them thought would be about bricks and mortar was instead about teaching and learning and new ideas and School 2.0.

For me, it was a chance to team up with Christian Long and also a chance to meet High Tech High founder Larry Rosenstock. It's rare that I get to be the most conservative of a group of speakers, but that's really how I felt today watching Christian and Larry shake things up. Christian's presentation about the future of learning spaces, and Larry's history lesson, activist speech and discussion of High Tech High were both amazing and inspiring. One of the things I actually love most about getting out and presenting is that you don't just present, but you get to listen a lot too. And if you ever have the chance to hear either Christian or Larry speak, do so. They're both brilliant and inspiring.

But what was most inspiring -- and what caused the title of this post -- is that this wasn't a conference. This was a group of teachers and administrators and city officials coming together because they knew that they wanted to change education in their town. In a town where only 25% of the residents have children in public school, they were able to pass a major bond initiative, and they are taking that public trust and really thinking deeply and critically about what they want education in their town to mean.

This is a small town suburb with one elementary school, one middle school and one high school. It's not, in my experience, where I've found the folks who are willing to gamble on changing the educational game. Suburban schools tend to work pretty well the old-fashioned way, even if they aren't the most innovative or the most progressive, they educate the kids and get them into college. Many people aren't willing to risk changing that -- for very understandable reasons. It's in our cities, where we see so many of the problems really manifest, that people are willing to go out on the limb and create something new. It's out of a sense of hope, yes, but often also out of a sense of despair that the old ways aren't working anymore. And on some level, it's when we see these ideas move into the suburbs, when communities where the residents could clearly argue that the school is "good enough" start demanding dreaming big about School 2.0 ideas that we're really going to see some change.

And these are putting everything on the table for change. And talking to these folks, and seeing them grapple with ideas we were putting out there. Listening to them talk about changing their framework for education... and looking out onto the room and not seeing one person with their arms folded in that "I'm hearing you, but I'm not listening to you" pose was inspiring. These are folks who want to engage in deep, meaningful change in their schools. From the mayor down to the first year music teacher, they were willing to spend their Saturday listening to three guys they probably hadn't heard of -- well, two anyway... they probably had heard of Larry -- try to offer them some questions to answer and maybe even an answer or two.

These folks were actively engaged in trying to change their world. And they were doing it in powerful, thoughtful, deliberative ways. They won't screw up. I just hope they invite me back so I can see the various stages of the process.

I'm tired, I'm writing this in the airport, waiting for the boarding call, and I want nothing more than to be in my own bed, but I'm also inspired and energized after taking part in today's meeting... it was a great chance to reflect on SLA by telling our story, it was an amazing chance to hear two educational voices who I greatly respect, and it was inspiring to watch an entire community embark on a similar process to what I've been through over the last two years.

Wow.

[Update: Be sure to read Christian Long's entry about the day as well.]

Over at Dennis Fermoyle's always entertaining blog, In the Trenches of Public Education, there's a fantastic post and discussion about Marc Prensky's article Engage Me or Enrage Me. Dennis Fermoyle is, well, enraged by Marc Prensky's ideas. Mr. Fermoyle's argument starts like this:

This morning when I got to school, I found that copies of a "motivational" article had been placed in all of the teachers' mailboxes. The name of the article was Engage Me or Enrage Me, and when I read it, I didn't know whether to laugh, cry, or vomit. I hope you'll excuse me for putting it so crudely, but the article really was sickening. I talked to another teacher who said he went and banged his head against a locker a few times after he read it. The point of the article is that we need to make school more fun for the students. The implied message was that if kids aren't performing, it's the schools' and teachers' fault because we haven't engaged them.

And he quotes enough from Prensky's article to give some credence to his frustration.

I suggest you read not only his blog, but also the comments, because Doug Johnson of the Blue Skunk Blog and others have some really interesting points to make. In fact, some of his are very similar to what I'm going to lay out here, I think.

I think Prensky's article is flawed, but still has some valid points. The biggest and best point he makes is about engagement. I think our schools do need to do a better job of engaging our students. I think we do have to find ways to integrate new tools into how we teach, and I (clearly) think that the technological tools we use outside of school need to find their way inside of schools as well. I even think that there are moments with simulations and games can play a major role in what we do in our classrooms.

But I'm going to also say that we also have to teach gumption. We also have to teach kids how to slog through things even when they aren't fun. And we have to teach kids what it means to see something through, and we have to teach kids that some values are not immediately fun, but are worth it long term. I used to say to my English classes, "Hey, on a warm spring day, I'd rather be outside playing Ultimate frisbee than teaching English, but we all have to be here, so let's find a way to make it meaningful." The flaw in Prensky's article is that there is a difference between recreation and work. It's wonderful when they overlap. It's wonderful when we learn from our recreation. But it's not always the case. And we need to teach kids how to find entry points into ideas that are not, prima facie, of interest to them. We need to find ways to teach students how to keep going, even when the thing they are engaged in gets hard or boring.

And that's the flaw with Prensky. We have to find ways to engage kids, yes, but we can't assume that just because a student can play a video game for eight hours without a break for recreational purposes that they know how to apply those lessons to chemistry. Or that the right way to teach them chemistry is through a game.

Most things worth doing get hard, and most things worth doing well force us to overcome a gumption trap or two when we would just rather give up. (And yes, I'm borrowing the phrase "gumption trap" from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.) Right now, in my basement, there's a 2 x 4 half-screwed into the wall where I was planning on building a peg-board tool wall for myself. It ended up being harder than I thought and, at least for now, I gave up. What did I do instead that day? I went upstairs and played with Jakob and Theo. More fun, more immediate gratification, and I'm better at it than I am at building things. But the 2 x 4 is still back there. And I won't get any better at this stuff unless I slog through it and figure out how its done.

Games and simulations take us so far, but they don't take us all the way there. There is a difference between having a hobby that you love and spending a few zillion hours on it and doing what you need to do be a productive member of society. What we have to gain from Prensky's argument isn't that we should use games to teach, even if that is what he suggests. What we have to gain from the argument is this -- what is it that our hobbies have in common that engage us? What is it that causes us to fall in love with doing something such that we can do it for hours? Hopefully, in the case of computer games, it's not just the cool graphics and opportunities to blow stuff up (or build civilizations or find a way for the 2005 Eagles to win the Madden Bowl) but there's something about the way we play that is engaging. Hopefully, when it comes to internet communication technology, it's not just the immediacy of the communications or the ability to have seventeen IM conversations at once, (or even that because the conversations happen more slowly than verbal conversations that you don't have to have as much to say) but that there is something new and interesting about the way we talk online that is exciting. How do we mine that and bring it back to the classroom? How do we find a way to teach kids that finding your own path to engagement and not always relying on others to do it for you is a powerful tool for self-actualization?

When I coached, I would have some kids for whom school was a real struggle. The idea of sitting down for two or three hours a night to study was horrific. But those same kids were at the front door to the gym or on the Ultimate field at 6:30 every morning, ready to practice. And trust me, no matter how much you love basketball or Ultimate, when that alarm rings at 5:00 am, very few people are excited and engaged about the idea of practice. And practices under me were tough... lots of conditioning, lots of skill work, lots of walk-throughs or controlled mini-scrimmages, but very rarely did we just play. And getting better didn't happen overnight, and it wasn't always easy. And kids came and came and were engaged. And I remember one student who, late junior year, started to really pull his grades from the C/D range to the B/C range all at once. We were driving home from a game, and we were talking about it, and he said, "Well, I had success on the Ultimate field, and I loved how it made me feel. And once you have that feeling in one place, you want it everywhere else. And so I thought about how I could take what I learned on the field and use it in the classroom." (And yes, I almost drove into a pole, listening to this.)

That's the ideal. That's the moment you spend your career waiting for, but it's also the moment that is so important when we look at what value Prensky's ideas have for us.

We need to do a better job of finding a way in with so many kids. We need to find the spark inside them and then fan that flame so that it can sustain itself. Engagement is not a one time thing, it's a daily struggle -- as the 2 x 4s in my basement will attest -- but if we can find ways -- be it with computer games and cool technologies or if it's through more "old fashioned" ways like after-school activities -- so that more students can experience that engagement, then we will have started on the right path.

The next step is when it gets hard. We have to find ways to help the kids see the connection between what they love doing now and the work and learning we're offering. It's about moving kids toward meta-cognition. What questions should we be asking?
How much time do you spend on that game?
How do you know you've gotten better?
How does it make you feel about yourself?
How did you solve problems in the game when you got stuck?
What lessons does that hold for you?
What do you think this tells you about the way you like to learn and experience new things?
* How could that play out in your classes?

And so on... it's not just that we need to play games in class -- there, Prensky doesn't hold much water for me. Instead, we need to create meaningful, relevant curriculum that allows students sufficient opportunities to really step up and take ownership. We need to use the tools that every other aspect of our society and update our schools and our classrooms. But let's also be sure. We can do all of this. We can make our schools inviting, progressive, technology-rich schools, and there will still be kids who refuse to engage or who simply push buttons and press boundaries, even with a curriculum full of new ideas. There is no panacea in education, and some kids will struggle simply because, on a nice spring day, they'd rather be outside too. Or on the internet, or playing games (on the internet). We have to keep working with them to understand their role in their own learning process. We have to make explicit the steps we would take to them to create an engagement classroom and assigments, but then we also have to make sure they are willing to interalize those lessons as well.

(I've got some formal writing on the School 2.0 concept coming due, and I'm having a heck of a time putting my thoughts out on the page coherently, so I'm going to take some of the ideas that have been rooting around in my head, some older ideas I've put out here, some ideas others have said, and some of the quotes Steve put up from our interview, and see if I can start to put something intelligent together. Forgive me if this feels a) a little rambling or b) a little undeveloped.)

It's really not about the computers. School 2.0 is older than that. School 2.0 is the tradition of Dewey. School 2.0 is born out of the idea that active, engaged, constructivist learning will lead to active, engaged students and people.

It's about the pedagogy.

Too much educational software just attempts to turn these really powerful devices into the next version of the workbook. That's criminal.

Computers and internet technology should allow us create, to communicate and to research.

They should allow us to spend less time anything that is not directly related to teaching and learning. We should digitize as many processes as we can -- as long as they make it easier for teachers to do what they need to do -- as long as it allows teachers to maximize the time they spend with kids.

They should allow us to bypass the parts of the school day that didn't matter and get more quickly into analysis. For example, we just got our digital microscopes at SLA. Students will be able to pull the images they see under the microscope directly into their lab reports on the computer and then label the digital photo. I used to spend hours trying to draw what I saw -- and because I'm a terrible artist, my lab reports became about my lousy rendition of cells as much as it was about what I knew.

School 2.0 recognizes that our walls have broken down -- and that's a good thing. Our knowledge, our ideas, our communication is no longer bound by the walls of our school or the hours of our school day.

School 2.0 believes deeply in the old Dewey quote: "If we teach today's students as we taught yesterday's, we rob them of tomorrow."

It comes from the notion that the "factory model" of education is flawed. So's the "banking method." We're not just trying to move kids through, and we're not just trying to fill them up. Time is a precious commodity in our schools, and we need to recognize that the things that are worth doing -- worth teaching -- take time.

It means understanding that facts, information, skills, meaning and wisdom are different, and that each one is valuable. But it also means understanding that facts and information used to be the top of the hierarchy where as now, skills, meaning and wisdom need to be. And it means that we as educators have to understand that meaning and wisdom are co-created.

School 2.0 means creating schools that reflect the world we live in today and creating schools that teach adaptability so that we can prepare for the world we will live in tomorrow.

It means understanding that the kids might often know how to use the new tools better than we do... or that they can certainly adapt to them faster than many of us can, but it means understanding how and why you use them... understanding the ethics behind using them... just became one of the most important lessons we can teach.

It means understanding that our students are content consumers and content creators... and learning what that means and the ramifications of that new paradigm is something every 21st century teacher and administrator must consider.

It means understanding that in our day, we passed notes in class and hoped they never got discovered. Today, the notes are posted on MySpace. The dichotomy between public and private spaces has broken down, and -- as a result -- all the post-modern theory about identity just became real. So now we have to help our students understand that -- more than ever before in our history -- we are the stories we tell, and we have to ask them, help them to analyze their own stories and consider how they want to present themselves to the world.

School 2.0 is about process as much as it is about product.

It's about collaboration -- it's about understanding that we are more than the sum of our parts. It's about understanding that my ideas will be made better if I listen to your ideas. And it recognizes that your ideas could influence me no matter where you live, as long as we both have access to a blog or a wiki.

And as a result -- it's really messy.

And none of this makes school easier. If anything, it makes it harder, because there isn't as clear a road map. There is no cookie-cutter. It's personal, it's community-based, it's relevant and it changes constantly.

And it's controversial because, despite the dour headlines in the media, and despite the proclamations of CEOs everywhere, our job is not to create the 21st Century workforce. It's our job to co-create the 21st Century citizen. Creating workers is not even half the job. We have to help our kids to become thinkers, scholars, activists, creators, scientists. We need to help them make sense of the world, even if we don't have much of a handle on it ourselves. If we do that -- if we help them to become the best people and citizens they can be, we'll have a pretty amazing workforce too. But let's never forget that creating the next generation of workers is not anywhere close to an important enough goal.

Anyone want to add to the list?

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to talk to Steve Hargadon over at School20.net. His interview with me is now online. He asked some really tough, interesting questions, and it's probably as animated and passionate as I've gotten in one of these interviews. It's a long interview -- 57 minutes long -- but he does a nice job of grabbing a bunch of clips right at the beginning and editing them to make me sound much smarter (and more succinct) than if you try to listen to the whole thing.

And I'm excited to meet Steve and Bill Fitzgerald -- and catch up with Will Richardson -- at the EdTechLive workshops hosted at SLA from January 29th through February 3rd. Hope to see you there.

One of the things I always try to keep in mind when I think about school planning and design, and something I said a lot to the faculty as we planned, was "There is no panacea in education and every great idea has a dark side, so what are the worst consequences of your best ideas?" It's important to do for two reasons -- one because I think that many educational institutions become reactionary too often, throwing the baby out with the bathwater when an unforeseen consequence of a really good idea comes along. I'd rather think about every potential dark side so that when they happen, I'm not surprised, I've thought about them first, and I've come to the conclusion that it's a consequence I can live with. And two, because you can look to mitigate them and plan for them, and speak about them before hand.

For example, when I ran the New Teacher program at Beacon, I used to tell new teachers, "The best thing about Beacon is that we have really empowered kids. The worst thing about Beacon is that we have really empowered kids. So, when the moment comes, and that student says, 'Excuse me, Mr. Lehmann? Your lecture today, a bit teacher-centric, don't you think?' before you decide to clobber the child, remember that the same student was at school until 7:00 pm the night before, working, building, creating, practicing, performing... and realize that both actions stem from a sense of empowerment, belonging and ownership of their school." And I've said that same thing to every teacher at SLA because nothing is a panacea, and sometimes, even the empowerment that we instill in our students can cross the line into entitlement, no matter how much we preach about the balance of freedom and responsibility. Why does that happen? If nothing else, it's because we deal with kids, and, by definition, it's their job to find the limits and test the boundaries.

All this is to say that we've found some problems along the way. We had some students use the laptops and instant messaging in really inappropriate ways. It was upsetting teachers and students alike, and we saw a creeping loss of a sense of safety. So what did we do? We talked about it as a community on our moodle site. The student forums were suddenly filled with conversations about what was going on, what screennames to beware of, how to block someone in iChat, and (I'm not kidding) discussion by students about how poorly this reflected on our community. The adults chimed in from time to time to give our perspective, and the conversations continued as we did continue to try to find out who was doing this. What was interesting is that as the conversations about the behavior continued, we saw less of the behavior, and I believe that to be two-fold, 1) We, the adults, made it clear that there would be consequences, and 2) (and more importantly) it quickly became obvious that the kids doing it didn't have a ton of support in the community. Kids were really upset.

And it took us a little over a week, but we did find out some of the students involved, and they are now in the process of dealing with the consequences. It's targeted, and we also are doing a lot of talking and research about cyber-harassment, identity theft and other issues of our Web 2.0 world. But this doesn't negate all the amazing work they are doing in the school using the laptops as a tool. And it doesn't negate the conversations I have with students at 10:30 at night beause they're working on a project and see me and ask for advice. We could lock down all these computers and try to guess every chat website out there, but that's not the right answer either for all sorts of reasons.

So we are also leaving iChat on the computers, and we're still encouraging students to find ways to use IM in ways that are useful, and we're still not naive enough to think that every iChat message is on-point and relevant, but it's a tool, and the kids and need to learn how to use it safely and effectively. And we'll be there to help, navigate, and -- when we have to -- punish for when they clearly violate the rules.

So what's the connection between the first few paragraphs and the last? It's not like we foresaw the specific way these kids chose to use iChat. But we did think that we would have some problems with it. And we knew we'd have to deal with it. And if we had just thought that 1:1 would make the school perfect, a stumbling block like this might have made us question whether it was worth it... whether we should give the kids access to chat programs... even whether giving kids the kind of responsibility that goes with the sense of freedom and ownership they have at SLA was a good idea. And while, yes, as we were investigating the problem, one teacher said what I'm sure we all were thinking, "You know... sometimes, it's just easier not to have the computer," it was a comment expressing frustration in the moment, not a true sense of wanting to get rid of the computers. She doesn't want to give up the podcasting project her kids are about to do, nor would she want to lose the Skypecast author interview they are doing in March, and she doesn't want to lose how the laptops have enabled us to create a community on moodle. But the problems that go with it are frustrating, even when you have anticipated them.

But we did see them coming. And we tried to warn the kids that we would deal with it when it did. And some kids, by very definition of being teenagers, did test where our limits were. And that's when the community responded the way that it did. That's been the good that has come from a lousy situation -- watching the community look at a situation and assert its values. With luck, now that the adults also have done their job and stepped in and identified and, yes, punished several of the students involved, we have also shown were limits were and what the consequences are. That's important too, as much as I hate doing it. It allows the kids who felt really betrayed by the actions of others to see that we care about protecting the community, it shows the kids who broke the rules that there are consequences, but because it was -- in my opinion, a reasoned, rational reaction that involved only kids we could prove were engaging in the behavior, it meant that -- I hope -- we (the adults) showed respect for the rest of the community and didn't throw the proverbial baby out with the bathwater.

In the end, of course, this is about much more than how a few students used their laptops. It's about the culture of SLA, and how we create an open culture where kids aren't just told what to do, but have a lot of ability to make decisions in a caring community. There's a Vaclav Havel quote that speaks powerfully to this whole issue:

"Freedom is only one side of the coin, where the other side is represented by responsibility."

We try every day to teach that. In one of my posts on SLA Talk to the kids, I used that quote specifically, and it might go in Version 2.0 of the Family Handbook, just so it's really out there. And it reminds me every day of my responsibilities to teach the kids that -- and that includes teaching consequences to actions. And it means that we always have to consider what we'll do when high school kids -- as they are wont to do -- test the limits of their freedom and shirk their responsibility to the greater community. But it also reminds us of our own values and how we have to strike that balance, and not take away the kids freedom to express themselves, freedom to make decisions, freedom to take ownership in our community, because that is our best idea, but rather, we just have to make sure we teach -- and embody ourselves -- the responsibility that goes with that.

As I was saying, if you have never seen Will Richardson speak, you really should. And now you can come to SLA and see Will, Steve Hargadon, Bill Fitzgerald as part of a series of Web 2.0 Workshops during the week of January 29th. There will be two day Moodle Workshops, two day Drupal workshops and Will will leading one and two day Web 2.0 workshops. Also, SLA faculty and students will around for panel discussions about how we're working toward building an example of School 2.0 from the ground up.

For us, it's a great chance to invite people in and involve them in our conversations. It's also a chance for us to learn more, as having a bunch of Web 2.0 experts in our building is pretty amazing too. And hey, we're also pretty proud of the place, so it's a chance to show off who we are and what we do as well.

So hey, if you're in the Philly area in late January, I hope we'll see you there!

We're starting to move with our blogs -- and with Elgg -- now... Our English teacher, Alexa Dunn has been doing an Odyssey blog project, and our Tech Coordinator Marcie Hull is teaching all the students to keep digital portfolios of their work. (And I'm realizing that I'm going to have to buy a much bigger server to hold all this stuff... we're going to have terrabytes of files very soon.)

It's exciting to see what's happening, as now that we've gotten our feet wet, more and more teachers are looking to help the kids get their work online. We've got some Spanish 1 videos about to appear, we're got a spoken word project, and once we get ProfCast on all the computers, the kids will be able to publish their PowerPoint presentations as m4p files with their voice explaining the project.

We're going to do a school-wide reflection blog experiment through Advisory right before the Winter Break, and that should be a really interesting experience as we ask the kids to all look back on their first few months of SLA. I'm curious -- what questions would you want a group of tech-savvy, first-class-ever ninth graders to answer as they take a look back on the whole of their initial experience? What questions would you want the teachers to answer?