The sound of history changing

Tom Friedman writes in his recent column The Last Person about India's own OLPC project - an effort to provide low cost computing devices and Internet connectivity to the poorest of the poor. Friedman relates this story about when a maid was told about the project:

Urmila told her it was true and that the machine was meant for people who could not afford a big computer. Added Urmila: “She asked, ‘How much will it cost?’ I said, ‘It will cost you around 1,500 rupees.’ [$30.] She said: ‘15,000 or 1,500?’ I said, ‘1,500.’ She was sure that if the government was doing something so good for the poor, it had to have a catch. ‘What can you do on it?’ she asked me. I said, ‘If your daughter goes to school, she can use it to download videos of class lessons,’ just like she had seen my son download physics lectures every week from M.I.T.’s [OpenCourseWare]. I said, ‘You have seen our son sitting at the computer listening to a teacher who is speaking. That teacher is actually in America.’ She just kept getting wider- and wider-eyed. Then she asked me will her kids be able to learn English on it. I said, ‘Yes, they will definitely be able to learn English,’ which is the passport for upward mobility here. I said, ‘It will be so cheap you will be able to buy one for your son and one for your daughter!’ ”

That conversation is the sound of history changing.

I would agree. Despite the skepticism, despite the over-hype, despite the needed leap of faith, giving students unfettered, ubiquitous access to the Internet will do more to improve education than any other reform effort. (India's own efforts in this area will be successful whereas MIT's neo-colonial efforts were a bust.)

Notice I said reform "education" rather than reform "schooling." There is a difference. This will be real learning, not the set of artificial academic hoops that currently pass for education, hoops designed as sorting tools rather than an enabling activities.

How do you as an adult learn? With a teacher? With worksheets? With tests? With a prescribed curriculum? With stated national outcomes?

Or do you learn what is of interest and importance to you? When you want to learn? With help from peers? In the ways that best suit your learning style? With self-assessment and application playing a major roles in you knowing if and when you've learned successfully?

Increasingly, schools and educators will be pushed aside by students wanting a genuine "education." And low cost netbooks, tablets and smartphones will be doing the pushing. Our dysfunctional U.S. government will do little or nothing to help provide connectivity on the scale of India's Aakash tablet project. But don't think it isn't coming anyway. Kids will figure out how to get this stuff without much help.

Prepare to greet The Diamond Age's Mouse Army very, very soon.

Image source

The reading pig

I rarely have my photo taken with celebrities, but I couldn't resist posing with the Reading Pig here at the Virginia Educational Media Association conference in Richmond. I can only hope the LWW is not too jealous.

John Pederson, eat your heart out.

A rubric for conference sessions and implications

 

One of the activities that is a part of my workshop on designing authentic assessment tools involves quickly creating a rubric to assess the quality of a conference breakout session. Since all participants have experienced the good, the bad and the ugly of attending this kind of "performance," such a tool is fairly fast and easy to build - and fun to discuss. Most efforts turn out looking something like this:

Level One

• Useful, applicable information
• Content matches program description
• Presenter organized and informed
• Begins and ends on time

Level Two

• Engaging activities
• Two-way interaction
• Practical support materials/handouts

Level Three

• Emotional engagement (humor, etc.)
• Mindset changing ideas
• Cookies, doughnuts, candy, etc.

OK, maybe not the best tool with the most comprehensive set of performance standards, but for 10 minutes work in a room full of strangers, a list like this is usually not too bad. And it provides a nice springboard to talk about the characteristics of a good assessment tool.

What struck me last week when doing this activity was a question asked by one of the participants: "Do conference planners ever give a rubric like this to presenters to use when preparing to give a session?" While ISTE conference planners ask for a pretty sizeable amount of information about a proposed workshop or session to help evaluators in their selection efforts (including objectives and an outline), I don't know if I've ever seen the actual tool that attendees use to evaluate the session to use while planning. What a helpful thing that might be.

Many moons ago when I ran summer boot camp technology classes, instructors received this tool to let them know ahead of time how the class was going to be rated by participants. I believe it improved the quality of the classes.

Authentic assessment seems to have fallen by the wayside in recent years as test mania has spread and good test taking skills have trumped good self-evaluation skills. Yet, with an increasing number of people who are contractors and self-employed, the ability to critically evaluate one's own work rather than leaving to a supervisor is more critical than ever.

I always add to my college course syllabi:

My job as teacher is not to assess your work, but to teach YOU to assess your own work. I will only help you evaluate the quality of the tools you use to improve your own efforts. That way you will continue to grow long after the class is over.

Hmmmm....