On Being An Expert

Think about anything you consider yourself an "expert" in - a skill related to your profession, a hobby, a category of trivia or knowledge. How did you become an "expert?" You probably have a certain acumen for learning new things related to your area of expertise, but ultimately, it came down to a decision you made at some point to seek and find knowledge about a topic. And then to do it again and again and again.

Talent is something you are more or less born with. Expertise is nurtured, coddled, and deliberately tended to so it will grow. You may have few talents, but anyone can develop expertise. It's a numbers and perseverance game.

That said, my district is in up to our knees in a software transition for every major information system we use. Every employee in the district is in effect relearning how to do their job this semester. Through a little bit of formal professional development and a whole lot more informal and self-directed, I've become the go-to guy for SIS tutorials, questions, and gripes.

The switch is affecting our students and families, too, because we don't have their access to online grades and attendance unlocked yet, so the school newspaper is working on a piece about it. I was approached by a student-reporter today for some quotes about SIS. 

I spent a lot of time crafting these responses, and I like 'em, so I decided to post them here, too. :)

STARGAZER: If you know, why was there a change from Edline to Tyler?

CHUCK BAKER: The way that SIS can manage and integrate the data we generate in our gradebooks and attendance with your student records is a leap from Edline. Our attendance software was from the 80s, our gradebook from the 90s... Data is KING in the 21st century, and SIS is going to make how we manage, manipulate and analyze our student data much easier.

SG: How will the affect students and their ability to view their grades easily like they did with Edline, and will students be able to access grades on Tyler like they did with Edline -- if yes, when?

CB: Right now, teachers must give students and parents print-outs or post grades on the wall of the classroom, which is what a teacher with more than 6 or 7 years of experience used to have to do anyway because it was the ONLY option. You know how things are a little bit sucky when an app is in beta? We're in beta with our SIS implementation still.The plan according to the district technology department is to open the student/parent portal (your side or SIS) for 2nd semester, but there's a chance it could be sooner.

Some elementary teachers were using NO form of electronic gradebook, so putting everything into SIS is a HUGE leap for them. We have to wait until the majority of teachers in the whole district have the gradebook figured out.

SG: Will there be any long-lasting affect of this switch during the current school year, if yes what will they be?

CB: I don't think you'll notice any long-lasting effects of this switch during the current year from the your teachers. The grade level offices are able to check attendance and discipline much quicker now, so they might be able to be more proactive in addressing patterns of absence or behavior before they are too late to fix. I think we might see more differences next year, when much more of the staff is very comfortable with the system.

SG: Have students complained to you about their inability to easily view their grades?

CB: My AP Stats students (my seniors) complained on like, the 2nd day of school, but my other students have been cool with the printouts I've been giving them. From my experience, giving students a piece of paper is sometimes more effective in focusing their attention away from the Snaps and notifications bombarding their devices. I find it in myself, too. I often will open my laptop or grab my iPad to do some actual work, but I get lost in social media or crushin' candy - if I need to leave the distraction of iPad, I do the work on paper first.

SG: What will be noticeably different from Edline?

CB: My favorite noticeable difference for students and parents to look forward to once your side of SIS is unlocked is that there will be much more information available to you in once place. Besides just grades, attendance will also be readily accessible, and teachers will be able to post any extra directions or links to web and/or multimedia content for a lesson right on the listing on the grade report. You would not have to specially ask for such and such handout that you need to complete missing or make-up work, or to find the link to your math teacher's video lesson.

SG: If you could chose a few of the positive affects of implementing this system, what would they be? The negatives?

CB: 

Positives:

1. The parent/student side of SIS looks more user-friendly than the reports Edline gave you, and I like the idea of being able to provide lesson resources right there instead of uploading them to a different site that you have to access separately.
2. Our various data sources integrate more easily - student attendance or behavior patterns can be caught, monitored, and addressed before they become larger problems.

Negatives:

1. Online grades being inaccessible for now
2. CHANGE. A lot of people really hate change, man.

"Good" Use of Education Technology

What makes for "good use" of a computer lab, laptop, or tablet cart?

The prevailing pedagogy for "21st century" or "rigorous and relevant" learning would say the ideal involves students engaged in some relevant, collaborative inquiry-based project, or simulating/investigating a model not otherwise possible or enriched by software/the web.

But what about other times?

Is standardized testing good use?
Is practice-testing for computer based standardized testing good use?
Is content-related gaming good use?
Is word processing good use?
Is watching tutorial/flipped classroom videos good use?
Are drill and kill practice websites good use?

The answers to all of these questions depends on the current situation in your building and the current needs of your students. Clearly, if all of your students have access to computers and a lot of bandwidth at home, using  the lab for students to finish projects or watch videos may not be a good  use. However, if you're choosing between students turning in 1970s-era projects or giving kids access to create polished, media-rich projects at school, the best use of resources is to have kids create in the lab.

Bottom line, the best use of school technology resources is to USE THEM. Once we're fighting everyday for access to the lab or carts then we'll be more selective and demanding of the way they are used. 

Declaring Racism "Over" Misses the Point for Students

My wife recently reshared this video from +FCKH8 on Facebook featuring children and teens from #Ferguson on the subject of racism and white privilege.

I actually didn't watch it until another friend had commented on the sharing from "Young Conservatives," who criticized the video for playing the race card, hypocritical claims, blame-shifting, and opportunistically "only" giving nearly 40% of the cost of the t-shirts they were selling to an organization fighting racism.

One of the most common reactions to "stop being racist," that I've seen is the declaration, "I'm colorblind. I don't see race. I treat everyone equally." I guess I get the point - this is probably often said with the best of intentions, but I believe its ignorant and naive.

It doesn't matter if white (and/or majority) people want to declare racism dead, if black (and/or other minority) people still believe they're experiencing racism. The best (because it was the hardest) lesson I've learned in my eight years of marriage is that the intentions or rationality of your actions and words matter less to someone else than your tone and the way they perceive your actions and words. "Perception is reality," my wife would calmly remind me later, after the hurt had subsided.

To say to your students that the color of their skin (and their experience in that skin) doesn't matter to you or isn't at least a consideration in the way you build relationships or consider relevance for your lessons is to belittle a part of their identity.

If your students identify with Mike Brown because he looks like them, then they identify with his story, too. You don't have to understand it, you just have to feel it. Listen to it. Let it happen.

This rings true across ethnicities. One of the least culturally responsive things I've done in the classroom occurred my 2nd year in summer school. I had about a dozen kids in an Algebra 1 class, I think consisting of all but one being African-American. Something I was proud of in that summer course was figuring out how effective making my kids take brain breaks could be. If the kids spent a good chunk of time on-task, they would get to nominate a song to be played while they did NO math for the duration. My white student was kind of disconnected from the school community in general, but the day I finally saw him feel a part of that class was on one of the last days of the session, when I forced a nomination out of him and we listened to some of his music. It happened to be "white" music (AC/DC), but the point was that in the name of being culturally responsive to the majority of the class, I burned the minority. Treating every student the same will always leave some students disconnected relationally. I never asked him directly, but even from observing his kid's demeanor, I could tell that his perception was that who he was didn't fit in with that classroom most of the summer.

Here's what I think you have to understand if you feel offended by this video - as long as some of your students perceive that the educational (and real world) experience will be different for them because of their race, you have a responsibility to at least acknowledge that racism might still be "a thing."