Instructional Management Systems June 17, 2008
Posted by Matthew Woolums in Book Review, Data, Opinion.add a comment
My district is evaluating instructional management systems (IMS) and it brings to mind two thoughts. First, I’m a firm believer that data is not information. Access to data is important, but teachers and administrators need to know what the data is, what it means, and how it should inform their instruction. Data itself is just numbers. So while I applaud the potential for an IMS, we need something to collect all of our data repositories so there can be some intelligible voice from the current volume of noise, I can’t help but think that the missing piece is change in teacher practice. I’m reading Schmoker’s “Results Now” (yes, it’s a book) and if you put in crayola curriculum, you’ll still get crayola results, even with an IMS.
Second, I’m struck by an ongoing conversation in one of my online classes around the issue of online grade books. Teachers seem pretty clear about seeing the benefits of parent (and student) access to assessments and the improvement in communication between the classroom and the home. At the same time, there is a reluctance on the part of some teachers to open up their assessment information. There is concern that it opens up criticism of the assessment practices of the professional educator, and the possibility that parents will complain if their students are not receiving the type of scores they expect their child to earn.
Both of these thoughts are connected. More data is a good thing for everyone involved in the education of our students, but more is still needed. We need to know what the data really is (attendance or standards for example,) how to interpret the data (how to read the details,) and what the data says about changing the learning environment. Data is not information, but it can be helpful in improving achievement. An IMS may be a helpful step, but it won’t by itself solve the problem of moving from a crayola curriculum to a learning environment characterized by rigor, relevance, and relationships.
21st Century Bookshelf March 25, 2008
Posted by Matthew Woolums in 21st-Century, Book Review.add a comment
From a tweet by Gary Stager, here is an Amazon bookstore devoted to the 10 essential books that should be on the bookshelf of every 21st Century educator. Educators still read and value books, right? Looks like I have a lot of reading to do. I think I’ll make use of my local library though, instead of buying them from Amazon.
http://astore.amazon.com/constructivistconsortium-20/
Talk About an Author Study! February 27, 2008
Posted by Matthew Woolums in 21st-Century, Articles/Videos, Book Review.add a comment
The students at Arapahoe High School have been studying Daniel Pink’s “A Whole New Mind” and the author will be joining them for a video Skype call for a 90 minute question and answer session. Details, along with a Ustream link to see the session for your self can be found on Karl Fisch’s “The Fischbowl” blog. This takes the idea of an author study to a new level when you can include participation from the author.
http://thefischbowl.blogspot.com/2008/02/ustreaming-and-live-blogging-daniel.html
A Whole New Mind April 28, 2007
Posted by Matthew Woolums in Book Review.add a comment
Just finished reading through Daniel Pink’s “A Whole New Mind, Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future” Riverhead Books, the Berkley Publishing Group, ISBN 1-57322-308-5 or in paperback ISBN 1-59448-171-7. It presents a compelling case for moving beyond the left-brained standardized test world most of us live in, to a perspective that respects the creative, the transcendent. Education is stuck in the left-brain dominance of accountability, high stakes testing and more currently the drive to make decisions based on accumulations of data. It wasn’t that long ago that we were talking about the whole child, and this book reminds me that whole-brain thinking is a worthwhile goal.
After making the case for right-brain thinking, Daniel Pink goes on to describe six senses that comprise the right-brain world view. Each sense, design, story, symphony, empathy, play, and meaning, seem to have a correlation to Howard Gardner’s multiple intelligences. The book is structured so that each sense comes with portfolio or collection of examples and recommendations on how to activate that sense.
If you are interested in brain research, and the future of education and the role of technology, this book is certainly worth your time.
Code Orange March 21, 2007
Posted by Matthew Woolums in Book Review.add a comment
Just finished a book by Caroline Cooney called “Code Orange.” I don’t usually read medical thrillers, reading through this one I was struck by some of the insight it provides into contemporary students. For example, the characters, mostly high school students, spend time texting each other. There is one section where the main character is sending out emails to people, probably more so than a typical high school aged student, but he is finding people to write to by using an unnamed search engine. He also leaves a note for his parents written on his laptop. In school he listens to his iPod during class. His teacher gives an assignment and reminds the class that reading the first chapter on Amazon.com to have something to include in their notes won’t be enough. It was a quick read, and worth the time if you enjoy young adult fiction.
http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780385732598
Data in, Data out March 8, 2007
Posted by Matthew Woolums in Articles/Videos, Book Review, Data.add a comment
eSchool News online published an article reporting on an appearance by Bill Gates before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. He made a case for establishing an education data center to track trends, identify what works, and generally provide the long-promised data-driven instruction we all hear so much about in education these days. The call for more attention to education is laudable, and I hope good things come out of it. I’m also a little skeptical. Recently I read a book called The Future of Everything, the Science of Prediction (ISBN-13: 978-1-56025-975-6) by David Orrell, PhD. In the book, he makes a compelling case for why the fields of weather, health, and wealth have such difficulty in making predictions. He explores the historic roots of predictions and points out the impossibility of making certain types of accurate forecasts. While he does not directly address the field of education, I found myself wondering how if educational forecasts would be subject to the same limitations. I’m a firm believer in the individual nature of learning. Spotting educationally significant trends will hopefully provide some benefit to students as a whole, but I doubt that it will ever provide the necessary insight needed for each student as an individual.
http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/showStoryRSS.cfm?ArticleID=6935
