Lessons Learned in Vermont

Rather than outlining my third day in Vermont, which included a trip over to the 3-8 building (Williston Central School) to see kids blogging, writing pieces for the Vermont Young Writers' Program, skyping with an author, using Pixton to create graphic novels, I'll close out my reflections from the trip as a whole.

Here are my major takeaways:

Third grade classroom

Sixth grade classrooms

1. In every classroom I visited, I saw kids sitting at tables--not individual desks.  This arrangement is a physical representation of the belief in collaboration.  I'd love to see our individual student desks replaced with collaborative work spaces like tables.
2. Kindergarteners can and want to blog, tweet, video chat...and not for a gimmick.  These activities transform their learning, helping them explain their thinking, publish their work, and connect to the larger world around them.  I'd love to see every student in our building publish work and thoughts on a blog hosted by their teachers.
3. Teachers who are connected via a PLN (personal learning network) can transform their instruction virtually (no pun intended) overnight.  Of course we should support the work of the teachers right next to us or down the hall, but why not reach out beyond our building to share best practice ideas with other teachers throughout the country and around the world?
4. If we are truly child-centered, our decisions about schedules, facilities, access to technology, and curriculum and instruction must not be based on adult-conveniences but on what's best for kids.  We also need to figure out how to help parents understand our choices, offer them boundaries, and hold them to those boundaries so they do not interfere with their children's learning.
5. We cannot depend on programs to define our instruction.  While teachers may benefit from following a set of lessons or a packet of resources, we must bring our understanding of best practice to everything we teach.

 Many, many thanks again to all of the people at Allen Brook School and Williston Central School who opened their classrooms to me and spent time talking with me.  Of course, I am especially grateful to Sharon Davison for coordinating my visit and for being an inspiring, motivating teacher.

Allen Brook, Day 2

Today at Allen Brook School I was treated to a full schedule beyond Sharon's kindergarten class.  She so wanted me to see as much as possible that she thoughtfully arranged for me to see a variety of language arts instruction, a Reading Recovery lesson, and iPads in math.  I also spent time with one of the district's literacy coordinators.  I won't detail my day here--I'll just highlight a few parts of the day (like the Vermont cheese sampler we enjoyed for dinner!).

The day began with a visit with Julie Rogers' first grade students during their morning meeting.  I loved watching how her students so confidently lead, participate in, and enjoy the meeting that Julie facilitated.  Julie's morning meeting affirmed my belief that students should be at the very center of their learning.  There's so much more to say about the Julie's teaching--I will share what I observed from her in a post in the near future.

Just after morning meeting I flew down the hall to Maria McCormack's room where I watched her students using iPad apps as a way to target their specific needs.  They could choose between the Multi-touch Math app or the Number Rack app.  Not only did Maria invite me to observe her students but she opened her own vault of resources by sharing her team's website, her curricular wiki, her email address, and her twitter handle.  I will certainly be checking in on all of her digital gifts.

Later I met with Carol Huntington, Allen Brook's literacy coordinator.  My hour-long conversation with her made me feel connected to a larger community of literacy leaders.  Her words were reassuring--just the reminder I need as I prepare to head home and do important curricular planning for the 2012-13 school year.  Carol said that she tries to get the most bang for her buck in her work.  In her school she began by defining balanced literacy, looking at the schedule to find time for a 90-minute literacy block, and agreeing on standards of practice for each team.  She also reminded me that the WHAT of what we teach is non-negotiable, but the HOW is debatable; we must not get derailed by the "side conversations" that drill down into minutia or veer into complaint sessions.  I look forward to meeting with the K-6 teams to discuss the standards of practice for our reading instruction.

I ended the day with a visit to Jessie Stein's second grade Writing Workshop.  Her students were using Scribblepress to publish their realistic fiction stories.  Her students were so eager to share their stories with me and show me how to use this app to create books.

It was another whirlwind day, one that highlighted the importance of organization, forethought, and assessment in instruction.  I am sad that my visit will end tomorrow, but I will bring home ideas, plans, and connections that will enrich my long-range vision and day-to-day work.

The Best Professional Development: A School Visit

This week I am lucky enough to be spending three days at Allen Brook School in Williston, Vermont with Sharon Davison and her kind and generous colleagues.  Back in November I found Sharon's class blog when I was doing some research for our kindergarten's Jan Brett author study.  One look at Sharon's jam-packed blog and I knew she was a dynamic, creative, and passionate teacher.  Now that I have had the privileged of spending one day in her clasroom, I understand that she is a remarkable teacher driven to deliver only the most sound, effective, and meaningful instruction to her students. 

Sharon immediately welcomed me into her class, introduced me to her students and co-workers, and then got busy teaching so that I could see all that I came to see (and more).  She knew I was particularly interested in language arts and technology, so I saw her class use the Smart board, iPads, and computers.  I saw the students sort letters, write words, and draft blog posts.  I watched them enjoy the newest addition to their class blog, a slide show Sharon put together using Smilebox.  I heard them ask when they would get to compose their daily tweet, helped two students return the iPads to the technology room, and listened with them as Sharon explained the concept of pinboards on Pinterest.  Students in Sharon's class are at ease with technology because they have learned how to use it and understand how it enhances their learning--it is not a gimmick or a mere substitute for pencil and paper.

Taking pictures during Explore Time

Sorting letters during Explore Time

Morning Message

Fundations with Smart Board and iPads

Nonfiction text displayed via ELMO

Kidblog

Sharon spends a lot of time with her students--I was amazed by her schedule (below).  The students only had one special today:  art...at the end of the day!  Although her days are exhausting, Sharon is grateful for the amount of time she has with her students each day as she layers her teaching, always knitting content, process, character, and metacognition into her work with the children.  It is all fluid.  Not a moment is wasted, not an opportunity overlooked to teach her students how to think, act, and reflect. 

In addition to spending hours in Sharon's class, I also had the chance to talk with Allen Brook's technology integration specialist, Bonnie Birdsall, over lunch.  I loved sharing our experiences and look forward to talking more with her on my final day in Williston.  My conversation with Bonnie further solidified how lucky I feel to work at Flint Hill School, where our 1:1 iPad/MacBook program makes embracing technology so easy.  Our challenge continues to be using technology to transform our instruction; I hope my visit to Allen Brook will help me bring back new ideas on how to do that.

Next Stop: Vermont

Now that Spring Break and the VAIS conference are behind me, I am setting my sights on Vermont where I will have the pleasure of visiting Sharon Davison and her kindergarten class at Allen Brook School in Williston.  I am looking forward to learning from Sharon, her students, and her colleagues about the ways they use their iPads and other technology to enhance and transform their teaching and learning.  I would never have known about Sharon or her blogging, tweeting kindergarteners if I had not begun my digital professional development journey this fall.  Each time I run through my Google Reader or Twitter feed I learn something new, feel inspired, and wonder what I might try in my own school. 

I will use my blog to journal about my experiences in Vermont, so perhaps someone can learn a thing or two from me.  Stay tuned!

Organic Technology?

At my school, we love the word "organic."  We love it so much, we even bought our own composting equipment and our students know how to sort their waste into "trash," "recycling," and "compost."

But I'm really more interested in our more frequent reference to organic change.  We believe that change should emerge "organically" (unless, of course, it is mandated), and that when the time is right and the people are willing, we will embrace the opportunities we are so blessed to have, like ipads for all students (and the teachers who work with them) in grades JK-4.  One can become numb to a word like "organic" because it feels too much like a fantasy, too obscured by visions of hippies and peace signs.  But I believe, much like Maria Montessori did, that if we provide people with the right materials, the best space in which to use them, and talented teachers to guide them, the organic process of coming to choose technology as a valuable resource in the classroom can and does happen.

Over the past week I have experienced this organic transformation. It began with a conversation with an amazing teacher who wanted to let her kids use their bubbling energy and creativity to create iMovies about the rock cycle.  It continued with an incredibly supportive technology integration specialist.  Then it traveled to the passionate science teacher and several other adults around the building who were willing to serve as expert geologists.  We knew we had found an amazing way to create a truly interdisciplinary performance assessment--we could naturally (organically, even) include science, language arts, and technology skills and content.

As we began to work through the plans we realized it would be easier to use Googledocs to create the unit plan since there would be four teachers (science, tech, homeroom, and coach) working on it.  We later decided that when students interviewed their primary source experts, they should record the interviews using the Voicethread app.  So, in the space of a few days, we found ourselves dripping in technology--not for technology's sake but because it would enhance teacher and student productivity.  The lessons begin next week and we can't wait to see what the students will create.  Watch for some of their projects here in the coming weeks. 

In a recent blog post, Troy Hicks lamented the negativity he felt when he and his colleagues presented their session on teaching digital literacy at this year's NCTE convention in Chicago.  He felt disheartened by teachers' concerns such as "I don’t have the time and the energy.  When do I have time to learn how to do this myself?  I am afraid the students know more than me. Where do I even begin?  I am teaching to my strengths – that doesn’t include this.  We can no longer talk with one another.  Why spend time on a tech project when we need to spend time on the paper…" 

Troy--don't give up.  We hear you.  We are getting there, little by little, one classroom discovery at a time.

Student Collaboration Begins With Teacher Collaboration

Several weeks ago in a meeting between middle school language arts teachers, a beautiful idea was born. Beth asked if she could have her fifth grade students work with seventh graders--both classes were working on writing memoirs, and she thought her fifth graders might benefit from sharing their work with the older students to receive feedback. And the seventh graders would benefit in many ways--we all know that we don't fully understand something unless we can teach/explain it to someone else, so they would strengthen their understanding of strong moves a writer makes by pointing out places where their fifth grade writing partners could make better choices (or by pointing out p,aces where they had. Ads very strong choices already). They would also be reviewing the "rules" of good writing so they could take another look at their own work. And who knows--they might even receive helpful feedback fom the fifth graders.

Luckily Jen realized what a great opportunity this collaboration would be for her seventh graders, and she and Beth proceeded with the plans. It took a bit of emailing back and forth to find the best day and time for Beth's kids to travel upstairs to Jen's room, and Jen had to prepare her kids to act as mentors for the fifth grade writers. But the arranging and prepping paid off today as a room full of middle schoolers worked as collaborators as the bravely shared their memoirs with a partner two years older or younger and gave and received feedback about their narrative leads, their conclusions, their word choice, their sentence fluency, the "power of I" (a Nancie Atwell writing rule), their "so what" and so much more.

To think that this opportunity would have been missed if the middle school teachers of language arts had not decided to meet. This group does not have a designated time to meet because department meetings occur in two groups: JK-6 and 7-12. That means that our middle school language arts teachers, grades 5-8, do not meet. But this group found their own time to meet in November. I do hope we will meet again soon.