Sunday, March 31, 2013

A Transparent Memo to the Participants of a Workshop: What would you write to encourage people to participate?



DRAFT
This is an open memo (or at least, that is the plan):  I am writing this openly, to share with participants and others.

I'm interested in getting the workshops to be a real example of interaction.  I want to video every part of the experience.

==== 
The core of the Fischler idea, the work by Enrique Gonzalez and the Big Picture education (Dennis Littky) and the idea of "transformed education" is: 
a) personalized instruction.
b) don't worry about the devices.  Clark says it is not the media, it is the teachers' methods.
c)  beliefs of teachers can get in the way of real learning.   "Learning Styles" is a distraction
d)  we don't need ipads to have students working to create projects together.
e)  we don't need internet to make portfolios.
f)  we can flip the classroom in a creative way so that students arrive in class ready to discuss the key new ideas and then to work 

When people ask me, "How do we use technology to teach?"  I want to unplug everything and just ask them "How do you intend to teach each student so that each student feels heard by a teacher?"  If it's 30 or 30,000 students, how can we use these new methods to personalize the curriculum and make the learning visible?

IN THE WORKSHOPS
I want to start with
a) what do we mean when we say "we need technology in teaching"?
b)  What is instructional or educational technology?
c)  What skills do you want to learn?
d)  How can we use devices in the classroom?
e) what will be our methods?
f)  how will we check to see that we have learned something?

then I want to show them all this memo and reveal that technology also is:
the pen and pencils
colored ink (whoooooaa   that was a technical leap)
chalk, green board
paper
posters
folders for portfolios
tables to sit around 
books
pins in the wall and tape

of course cameras, computers, tablets, Internet, etc.

It's the definition of "educational technology":
Instructional technology is "the theory and practice of design, development, utilization, management, and evaluation of processes and resources for learning," according to the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) Definitions and Terminology Committee.[1] Instructional technology is often referred to as a part of educational technology but the use of these terms has changed over the years. Educational technology is the study and ethical practice of facilitating learning and improving performance by creating, using and managing appropriate technological processes and resources."[2] While instructional technology covers the processes and systems of learning and instruction, educational technology includes other systems used in the process of developing human capability.From Wikipedia

instructional technology covers the processes and systems of learning and instruction... it's not just the devices

I want them to really participate in this workshop (to edit the book that I will bring) and create a workshop to bring their methods to this discussion.

Will this procedure be too strange or unfamiliar?  (usually there is a lecture).   I will be prepared for a lecture and a "hands on" session where students go through a checklist of "how to use this device" and I certify them at the end of the workshop as "ready to teach Technology in Education."


I have two groups
a)  Technology in teaching to some students of Tourism and Hospitality (who might want to learn how to use technology or to know what they are missing and what they would be using if they were in university in Venezuela or Mexico or Spain or USA)

b)  the flipped classroom with professors.  The focus will be 1. How do we make learning PERSONAL?   
2. How do we use lectures effectively?  
3. How do we arrange the classroom time so EACH STUDENT is contacted by a professor or by a teaching assistant and so that EACH STUDENT really gets challenged to learn?  
4. How do we create an environment for learning?   
5. What role does the flipped classroom play?   How can we use the flipped classroom when we don't have the internet?
6.  In this workshop, do we have time to use the flipped classroom approach?

I want them to speak from their own experience. 
I want them to speak and we will record the session.   I think a group of teachers (and students) can create a system that is better than what I described in the workbook.

Will this be too much of a shock to the professors who want to learn about the Flipped Classroom?
If they want a lecture, I can give the lecture.
I just want to discuss with them, "How can we make this session interactive?"
In addition
a) How can we create time for me to sit with each of them, one at a time, to check their prior knowledge?
b)  How can we arrange the class so that they work together or individually and I can check their understanding?
c)  What do they want to be the outcome?
I think it will be easy with these professors because you say that the Cuban system encourages discussion and ongoing verbal summaries in class (through the day) to check understanding.

I want their "homework" or work product from the workshop to be a handbook about how to make the Flipped Classroom in Cuba.

As you can see in the workbook that I sent you, I want the participants to be active.  this workshop is a reply to Gilberto's question "How do you use technology in teaching?" and I have tried to bring in Clark's philosophy and articles.

I look forward to further discussions.  I believe in transparency. I want this entire memo to be open to the participants.   I think you said that Gilberto can arrange for printing at the school.

=======  

Monday and Tuesday
Plan for the class called "Technology in teaching"

1.  Define "instructional technology"
2.  make a list of available technology
3.  ask students, "What skills do you want to learn today?"
4.  create tasks to check skills
5.  hands on, learning with partners
6.  are we limited by the technology in this room?
7.  can we promote learning with the tools at hand?


Key questions to guide the class
1.  What technology is needed to meet the needs of the students?
2.  can we bring portfolios, projects and personal learning plans into cities that don't have broadband internet?
3.  What 500 videos should students see before they leave high school?

GOAL
What is the product?
Every person leaves the room with a list of skills.  The list is about skills that the students want to learn about to become better learners.

Tuesday
1.  Review the previous day (show the instructor what you learned)
2.  get more hands on practice with the tools.
3.  Describe how you plan to use Personal Learning Plan (PLP), projects and portfolio in the future.  
4.  how can we go farther?   where can we learn more about the Personal Learning Plan?


======== 

WEDS and THURS
THE FLIPPED CLASSROOM
1.  Describe the flipped classroom
2.  Ask the participants to imagine the benefits of the flip
3.  What could go wrong?
4.  what tools are needed for the flip
5.  how could the flip be organized in a city that does not have easy access to the Internet?
6.  what lectures work well for the flip?



KEY QUESTION to guide the participants:
Can we organize a flipped classroom in a city that does not have easy access to the Internet?  
How?
What tools do we need?
What training do we need to give students and teachers?
What procedures are needed?


GOAL:  Each person creates a video for a flipped lesson
(in the second day, each participant actually makes a video to demonstrate some important points)
SECOND GOAL:  we work together to make a better workbook.
What pages in the workbook worked?



HOMEWORK:  a) watch the flipped classroom by Katie Gimbar
INDIVIDUALLY to get the experience (perhaps we simulate this by asking each person to watch the video in turn while doing a project)
b) develop a script for a video

THURSDAY (next day)
1.  review the previous work
2.  create the videos
3.  describe the flip procedures for a school that lacks internet and lots of computers.




=======  

DISCUSSION
For both workshops
How can we arrange the classroom time to create time for the instructor to meet with each person or at least with pairs of people?
a) PAST what information and expectations do you bring into the class?
b)  NOW:  what do you want to learn now?
c)  FUTURE:  What do you want to do in the future?
How can today support your plan?

Perhaps:

Split the class into small groups

1. start with a group lecture.   
2.  build an understanding about "how will we use the class time?"  (Posters to create a "culture of interactive learning and participation" in the class)
3.  students work on activities
4.  pairs of students meet with instructor (instructor walks around the room)
5.  Report back to the whole class.  Instructor checks the understanding
6.  Write "we learned this" in our portfolios.
7.  Reflect:  how does all of this connect with the main topic?
Repeat (move to the next topic)


Activities include
a) goals for the class and for individuals
("get to know each other")
b)  personal learning plan
("put your goals in writing")
c)  set up a portfolio to capture work
(two folders:  (A) projects, classwork portfolio
(B) personal learning plan, plus a journal)
d)  plans for getting the portfolio into a digital form.  What are the options?
e)   think about projects  (what project can we create to capture what we learned here today?)

Schedule (expectations)
Instructor's time
Lecture 5 minutes
Organize the discussion
Walk around the small groups, meeting with pairs or individuals.
Learn every student's goals.
Learn every student's names (we know that students learn more when an instructor knows something about them)

Participants' time (we expect participants to do these things)
Interrupt the professor with questions during the lecture
Talk in the discussion
Build a personal learning plan
start a portfolio
work on projects

Other procedures
1. put posters in the restroom to promote random learning
2.  plan the breaks.  food, water   Create breaks to support learning.
3.  timing:  use an audio timer (music goes on every 10 minutes to indicate a change in activity)
4.  choose the method of homework.
5.  write the key questions on the board
6.  Ask, "How will we make the learning visible?  How can we see the learning?"
7.  Every person gets a notebook.  "the design notebook" -- use the book to capture designs.  It's the Dan Pink exercise.
8.  An empty chair in the room.   Everybody looks at "who is not in this room?  What can we do to include that person?  How will that person know what we are learning?"   Jeff Bezos of Amazon always has an empty chair in the room.
9.  The "E" exercise.   Write the letter E on your forehead using a pen.
What are some more activities?

Some of this uses the "R" words from Marilee Sprenger's  Brain Book
How to Teach So Students Remember
Study Guide written by Marilee Sprenger
Reach
Reflect
Record
Reinforce
Rehearse
Review
Retrieve
Realization
These words might guide us in the end of the workshop to know where we could improve the process.

This document is distributed in the workshop to help participants see the direction that we are going.  Instead of lecturing about the "importance of interactive work in classes to produce learning," we can use interactive work.   The method is the memo.    For younger people, teenagers especially, the memo is not needed, but some of the curious students will want to know "where are we going with this process?" and "Do I have to take notes?"  If we distribute this document, we answer both questions.

Send comments to TheEbookman@gmail.com


Note to Mario:
OUR PAPER  [I include this comment so that participants can think about contributing to the paper or article]
I also hope you have had time to think about the paper or article that we will write about "What can U.S. teachers and principals learn from Cuban teachers and principals?"    


There are two topics
a) "What can U.S. teachers and principals learn from Cuban teachers and principals?"  (especially the Beca and the high school away from home)
and
b)  in Distance Education:  "What can teachers in USA learn about distance education from Cuban professors?"  

DISTANCE EDUCATION PAPER
Do you think it is a good idea to show any of this to Gilberto to build connections to the distance education program in Univ of Havana?

Maybe I can connect with a professor of distance education at Havana and you, he and I can write an article about "What can teachers in USA learn about blended learning and distance education from Cuban professors?"   and that article because it has distance education can be published in TOJDE   Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education.   I'm downloading the entire 12 years of TOJDE to bring to the workshop.  (4 issues per year x 12 years =  48 PDFs).


A European experience with iPads -- from three letters

A father in Europe put me in touch with several teachers at his daughter's school.  The teachers wanted to introduce some independent learning by students using iPads and they asked for some of my experience.   I posted a series of iPad youtube videos that I found.  You can see that link here

This is what most teachers and parents expect when you say, "Technology in the Classroom."


======
My words are in italics.   The Teacher in Europe is in colored letters...
The aim of this blog post is to share with you the response that I got from the teachers.   Their experiences show some of the challenges of relying on technology to provide the

====

FIRST LETTER (written in September 2013)  in green.
I asked, "Do you have any videos showing your school and your best practices?"


I apologize for the late answer, I was very busy with my little children.
The topics you want to discuss are very interesting.
However, it is important to underline that the our school is very different and far from the American school in structure, contents and student’s approach.
Here, we give more importance to the concepts to teach than to the competences to achieve, and it would be quite hard to change this general attitude.  My opinion is that it’s important to both learn concepts and learn how to make use of them.
Anyways, we have gotten into the game and we have started the tablet project in classes, trying to follow the students closely while they get familiar with it.
If you agree, I think we can start from how new technologies can improve the interaction between teachers and students and how to promote the engagement and the active and conscious participation of the students at school.
I forwarded to my colleagues the whole material you attached to your last e-mail.
Our traditional teaching method in frontal lessons relies on the accurate introduction of the topic (e.g. the evolution of tragedy from Shakespeare to Manzoni), followed by individual study and oral and/or written tests to evaluate learning.  On the other hand, our tablet experimentation focuses on building knowledge side-by-side with the students.  For instance, during an one-hour lesson, we introduce the topic for 15 minutes, and then ask the students to elaborate it through consultation of handbooks (iPads) or the Internet, individually or in groups.  Our aim is to build "our own textbooks" with the students.

I have no videos to show you at the moment.
Please call us by Skype.  On Tuesday the English teacher will be also present, and helping with translations.  In case communicating orally won't be satisfying, we could use the email.  


====  
In September 2012
We had a Skype call, I learned about their first use of tablets in the classroom and we agreed to continue to look for suggestions about "how to use iPads in the classroom."  Some of the teachers wanted a list of suggestions for "using technology in the classroom."  I then sent three questions ...

SECOND LETTER ( four days later)   in blue


thanks for your notes.
You ask us: 
A) Where is the "modern" Maria Montessori or Jean Piaget or John Dewey in your country?
b)  What schools do you admire?
c)  What have you seen in a classroom that you admire?

Good questions!
  1. Montessori's method is in the dumps. There are many reasons for that: public system don't have money to promote and to finance small classes, with a so special relationship between teachers and students. Moreover, there's an impossible conflict to resolve (actually) between traditional approach and alternative approaches. 
  2. I admire the school where students are the focus of teaching; where students finish their path with success and with a real excellent culture and qualification. For that, I think, it's necessary to create a good working environment and we've got to get students used to agreement, to a healthy contention.
  3. The best that I have seen  in my ideal classroom  is cooperation and a good greeting.
My school is a private school: so we've more possibilities than public schools. But we've got to respect rules imposed by Department of Schools: so we have specific programs to follow.
Taking on this new challenge means to conjugate what's better is in "old" school with what's better in new approach.
Our classes are composed by 15 (up to 35) students: it's impossible for us making school with one student at a time. We guide a full group, very heterogeneous about knowledge and competences.

For us the problem is to be very pragmatic: our students have to take and to pass an important exam at the end of lyceum. So they must be really prepared! 
Our programs are so vast! They can't choose what's necessary to study (there's not optional courses: all is core curriculum). 
As you observe, our scholastic system is limited.

See you soon!


=======  

I had pressed the teachers in the Skype call to tell me about how they have used technology to create time to meet one-on-one with each student.   How can you arrange the class (and perhaps use technology) to create time to sit with each student?   I sent the school some books that were translated into the local language, particularly a Dan Pink book called Drive.


In March 2013 I went to New Zealand and Australia where I connected with some teachers and students. ...  I suggested that the students in ANZ could contact the European teachers.
SIX MONTHS LATER in PURPLE
 (I wrote (A) to ask about their progress and (B) to connect their students with some students I met in Auckland.)   

Here in my school we're ok. Sorry for my long absence, but I had a lot of problems and responsibilities at School and my time is so... short.
Your ideas about School and didactics are really great and we enjoyed the material you sent us.
Our didactical experimentation with tablets has just  started to work: the start was very difficult.
Here are our main problems:
1) big (very very big!) difficulties in changing the didactical approach (many colleagues struggle and they go on with old scholastic approach). It's absolutely useless to work with tablets in this way! We only changed medium (tablet vs books), but almost nothing has changed.
2) It's very hard to supervise students' attention during lectures/lessons: we often see students playing games or hearing music (etc...).
3) Many parents are skeptical about new technologies in education: so they blame us teachers if kids don't achieve good scholastic goals.

TEACHER NETWORK:  I'm very interested in the network that you created:   the project of connecting teachers from different "lands" is useful.
I think it's fondamental to compare each others about School: maybe it's possible to make something of extraordinary!

STUDENTS TO STUDENTS:  No problems if students from Auckland contact us: it's a pleasure!

p.s. Why not create an "event", an international convention about "world" school and about good practices in school, where there's possibility of talking and debating between different teachers from all the world.

====

Discussion:   Richard E. Clark's work is helpful to remember that "media are mere vehicles" in delivering information.  Whether you get your vegetables delivered by a large truck or by some farmers pushing carts, the nutrition you get from the vegetables will be unchanged by the method of delivery.



If you (reader) want to contact these teachers and see if they are interested in more discussions, I can forward your questions to them.    TheEbookman@gmail.com.  

If you have materials for the Teachers Network or if you want to see the International Network of Educators, please go to the following address:  https://sites.google.com/site/networkofeducators/

Technology with Teaching: An example of a Google Plus "Community Discussion"


I'm giving a workshop soon in a community where there is virtually no broadband access to the Internet.   I've recently visited several schools in New Zealand and Australia that use the Internet to build digital portfolios for students as well as the famous HighTechHigh.org school in San Diego (where students put their portfolios online).

I have been looking for an example of "how teachers can use the Internet in teaching."  Here's an interesting exchange that shows the advantage of posting to an online community.



Anne Croft

Mar 30, 2013 (edited)  -  Discussion
Does anyone know of a twitter gadget that I can add to a Google site. I want to add a twitter feed onto a school Google website but the twitter gadget doesn't seem to work
14 comments
Anne CroftYesterday 8:28 AM
+
1
2
1
Sorted! The featured Twitter gadget wasn't working until I put in this gadget by URL https://gist.github.com/dideler/2153825/raw/419f2207f8afeba185229f382ec8fabfcb40711c/twitter.xml
Found the answer on this site add a twitter feed | amslerclassroom
Thank you Tony Amsler!




Here's the same post 


You can find this Community HERE   
https://plus.google.com/u/0/communities/101802680117484972712/

It's called Google Apps for Education

I learned about it when I signed up for a course on MIT's Media Lab
















Friday, March 29, 2013

Download these posters (developed from Richard E. Clark's writings) and improve them - use Clark's "Two Important Features" when designing a poster


In a phone conversation in February, Dr. Clark said that he has observed two important features to a poster that communicates well (and is therefore effective) and perhaps leads to changing people's behavior.

a)  There is an easy-to-remember analogy 
b)  There are instructions to give the reader of the poster a new procedure to follow.

The delivery truck in the poster below is an example.




The following posters were developed over the past sixty days to prepare for a workshop.  You are invited download the workshop book and develop better versions of these posters.


DOWNLOAD THE WORKBOOK (get the posters here)







The previous four pieces can be arranged to give the full message.


A description of these posters







To get the full sense of this poster, see the paper that Dr. Clark wrote in 2005 (a chapter in a Handbook of Multimedia Learning)
Here is the link to the article


Dr. Clark came up with this summary after reading about the Debunking Handbook.
Procedure summarized by Richard E. Clark. cogtech.usc.edu. See full document at sks.to/debunk. Cook, J., Lewandowsky, S. (2011), The Debunking Handbook. St. Lucia, Australia: University of Queensland. November 5. ISBN 978-0-646-56812-6.


This poster needs work.  Too much text

 These two posters (above and below) are based on an article that was in American Educator in Spring 2012


Some of commentary that might be interesting about these posters was given in a series of videos on YouTube.  You can see part 8 of the series here. It's a discussion about how librarians can help people with their searches.

To close, let's look at this technique.   Dr. Clark mentioned it in the interview after the group phone call had ended.  It was a passing observation, an example of how a slight change in a procedure can lead to deeper work by the student ... it's the method, it's the procedure, it's not the concern over "we need better technology.  The students would learn so much more if only we had more xxxx devices."





DOWNLOAD THE WORKBOOK (<<< get the posters here)

Thursday, March 28, 2013

Richard E. Clark discusses two key questions for education: How can we best capture expertise and knowledge from experts? How do we teach the expertise effectively to other people?

Two key questions for education today
How can we best capture expertise and knowledge from experts?
How do we teach it effectively to other people?   How do we transfer that expertise and knowledge?
These are two questions that face education today.


The following interview took place in Dr. Clark's office in Redondo Beach, Calif. on 27 February 2013.  

Partial transcript of an interview with Richard E. Clark.
See the website for papers at the CogTech.usc.edu website

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhsBqmakNMc&feature=youtu.be





Summary of key issues

We talked about expertise that comes from a lot of experience.  -- Richard Clark
Highly accurate pattern matching and predictions about what happens to those students as they go through a program.  

is it possible to capture how he does it?         Capture Expertise and knowledge
how do we teach it effectively to other people?   Transfer that expertise and knowledge
The two questions that face education today.


=============
PARTIAL TRANSCRIPT
Starting at Minute mark 0:22

What you are describing to me is expertise that happens as a consequence of a lot of experience.  -- Richard Clark

Let's take you [Will Sutherland] as an example.

Highly accurate pattern matching of what you see in students and your prediction about what's going to happen to those students as they go through a program.  

1) I'm curious to know how we can capture from you your expertise and knowledge.
2) How do we teach it to other people effectively?   Transfer that expertise and knowledge
The two questions that face education today.


That's what education should be about.

Capturing expertise and knowledge
and Transmitting it effectively so that it can be applied.

We have ways to capture that expertise that people are not paying attention to because so much of it (the expertise) is implicit.

It's unconscious.

I don't think you know exactly how you do it, because when you see those students and watch them behave,  all of a sudden it just occurs to you "This fellow is going to do fine."

Then it will occur to you with someone else, "Whoa, this is a problem."

Are you deeply aware of what you notice?  Generally our evidence is that you are aware of about 30 percent __________.

70 percent, most of which is at the decision level, at the deep mental analysis level, is not available to you because you have done this so much that it is automatic, like talking or driving a car.  


So I want to find out how to capture that kind of information from experts and build it into an education, even if it is information about how to solve a math problem.  Math experts know how to solve problems and they have very quick strategies for it, and obviously some of those strategies require a lot of prior knowledge.  

That's why prior knowledge turns out to be very critical.  There are certain areas of math that you can't master until you've grasped the math of other areas.
Get this article

Once you've done that, there are problem solving strategies that are available to [virtually] all areas of mathematics but they are quite specific to the area and the type of problem.  

There are very few general problem solving strategies that can be applied effectively.  That's what swims upstream against the belief systems of so many teachers.

(end partial transcript at 3:01)

COMMENT:  Dick Clark is perhaps referring to the belief that teachers should adjust their presentations to fit the "learning styles" of individual students.  In fact, the adjustment should be to the prior knowledge of the students.  Ideally, the math teacher would put students into groups that are organized by prior knowledge so that presentations could be made based on the prior knowledge of those students.

(more of this video will be transcribed here over time.)

To read more about Richard Clark's analysis of "Popular but Questionable Principles"
Clark, R. E. & Feldon, D. F. (2005). Five common but questionable principles of multimedia learning. In R. E. Mayer (Ed.), Cambridge handbook of multimedia learning.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

see other publications at COG Tech http://www.cogtech.usc.edu/recent_publications.php
=======

Get these posters
See pages 31, 33, 35, 37 and 39

also on the phone call (part of the interview):
Will Sutherland,  ws@qbeglobal.net        www.QBEAcademy.net   life skills at sea (entrepreneuring)
Noel Thompson, noeldthompson@gmail.com
John Vornle,  johnvornle@gmail.com     www.SpacePathAhead.com
Mario Llorente, mariopatriot@yahoo.com
S. McCrea, transcriber   visualandactive@gmail.com

Sunday, March 24, 2013

More Subscriptions for this YouTube Channel (please). Here's why: Students at Stonefields School, Auckland, describe the Pit and "What are the Qualities of a Learner?" (transcript of a school-made video)


Thank you, Lutz
I selected this video for transcription because one of former language students (Lutz, who exemplifies the qualities of a curious learner) asked me to explain what the students were saying (the volume is low on the video).

I would not have watched or listened to this video -- I had posted the channel and directed my colleagues to look at the channel.  Lutz asked, "What is that girl without a tooth saying?"

Only three subscribers?!!  (March 2013)  If you have a YouTube account, please subscribe.   And how about a thousand likes...

Hmmmm.   Lutz's wife is a teacher.  Lutz has good radar for effective school programs.  I should listen to this request...


Here's the transcript.


Building Learning Capacity
a video from Stonefields School


0:00
A definition for learning now at Stonefields would be
making progress
learning new things
using the learner qualities
learning as well as you can


0:28 shows the 7 learning qualities
determined
self aware 
reflect
connect
think
wonder
question




not just learning, but learning to learn



======= 
0:38
second student
The learner qualities are qualities that help you learn at Stonefields school
there are seven learner qualities

Q:  What makes a learner a good learner, Ashton?
by using the learner qualities, 
determined
question
reflect
self aware 


1:00
reflect
determined
think
question
wonder
self aware

1:07  a new student
You just do "like that"  (holds up hand) (REFLECT)
and you can also use THINK

I try to cut (catch?) and wonder
like I ask questions to other people if they can help me with my learning


1:30
Q:  What do you reflect ?
You can reflect what your next step is.
You can reflect any time of the day.  and you can reflect on your learning to see if you have done good or if you have done bad in your learning.


Q:  So what do you ask yourself when you are reflecting?
What you enjoyed, what you learned, what you can improve on.


Q  What can you improve on?
PROBABLY connect.

Q:  Tell me what you do to connect?
I connect the easy stuff that I know to the stuff that I want to work out and then I  try to get the answers.


Q:  Which learner quality would you say is the trickiest one?
Self Aware.

Q:  tell me why you find that tricky.
Because sometimes I don't know when to be self aware.    But I should be self aware all the time.

at 2:18 a chart is shown.
And the other tricky one is questions.  because when we are in groups, we ask other groups  and they might not get the answer 

and when I ask three other people and the teachers are not there, then I have to try to work it out myself.

====

In the chart, there are four examples for Self Aware

Definition:  Aware of yourself as a learn, you actions, thoughts, and next steps.

First stage:  I am not sure of the things that might help me to become a better learner

Second Stage:  I am beginning to billed awareness of what I need to do to become a better learner, I can identify some next steps to improve

third stage:  I am self aware in my actions and reflection to further improve and develop my strengths.  I independently work toward achieving my next steps.

==============






The chart also shows tips for Connects and Is Determined.

Connects = Linking knowledge toothier to create new understandings

Third Stage:  I make many links and connections between pieces of knowledge to crate new ideas or deeper understandings.

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Determined =  the ability to stick at a challenging task when you feel like giving up.  the desire and determination to self improve and succeed. 

I can self-talk to show determination with tasks that are a little tricky and motivate myself to keep going

THIRD STAGE:  I have a number of strategies that help me to be determined when task are challenging.


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We use learner qualities at 
Stonefields school by 
well… not giving up.  When you are stuck, you [can] be determined and try to get out of the Pit.

at 2:57 the diagram of the PIT is shown.

It can be good to be in the Pit.  sometimes because you will learn from what the mistake that you did.


3:08
Q:  What do you do when you get stuck as a learner?
I use my prior knowledge, i use the learner qualities  which mostly I would rather be determined.

3:28  
Q:  as a learner do you get stuck?   
yes I get stuck

Q:  How often?
Almost every second of the day.

Q:  Wow, so is it up to you or the teacher to make you stuck?
It's up to me.

Q:    What is the best thing about Stonefields school?
Because they get me stuck in the pit.  and challenge me.

Finding techniques to be in the pit.
and get stuck and find and use techniques to (um)  try and figure it out.

4:05
Q:  how often do you get stuck?
A lot

Q:  What helps you to get out of those stuck situations?
To ask a buddy or to use some of the secrets that the teachers give us

4:25
Q:  Has your notion of learning changed?
yes immensely

Q:  can you tell me about that?
uh   When I first came here, I thought that learning was getting good grades,
doing what the teacher says, doing your homework. things like that.

but now it's more, it's not just the surface learning,  it's deeper learning.
Q:  can you explain what that deeper learning is?
it is having a system of how we learn, knowing how we learn.  For example, we have been learning about the brain.   We use learner qualities, learning process, our vision principles.  
We learnt much more about learning, we didn't just learn.  We learnt about learning.

music

Building Learning Capacity  
channel  StonefieldsSch   7 videos  




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commentary
Stonefields has appeared to take some of the best of the IB program ibo.org and simplified it for kids to be able to rehearse and call on when they are "in the Pit."

A frequent comment was "How do we make learning visible?"

I'll return to this blog with an analysis of some of the walls in classrooms.

WORTH A LOOK:  Chris Bradbeer's blog  openlearningspaces.blogspot.co.nz



Let's get more subscriptions on this school's YouTube channel.