If you don’t live it, it won’t come out of your horn. ~ Charlie Parker
dogtrax
I am a technology liaison with the Western Massachusetts Writing Project and a sixth grade teacher.
Homepage: http://dogtrax.edublogs.org/
Posts by dogtrax
The Guilt of Gaming
Nov 27th
(Want to give the game a try? Click here to play my video game)
You know there is that the famous axiom about writing: Write what you know.
And I have the Charlie Parker quote here in my blog as my tagline: If you don’t live it, it won’t come out of your horn.
So why am I feeling a bit guilty about playing video games in my spare moments? Isn’t a corollary of those sayings: You need to play the game to teach the game?
I have been introducing game design to my sixth grade students (moving towards a STEM-centered game design project later next month) and while I am open to their insights and inputs (most of them have way more gaming experience than I do), I know I need to keep up my skills on video games, too. I need to speak their language and I need to at least convince them that I sort of know what I am talking about (even if I have to fake it once in a while). Still, every time I pop into a gaming site that we use, I feel this little twinge of guilt.
Is this really what I should be doing with my time?
The other day at school, we had our parent conferences. The meetings went fine, but a few parents wanted to know more about the spelling and mechanics strategies that we are using in sixth grade. They reminisced about “the old days” of ELA, when students used pages of worksheets to drill a skill into their heads. I don’t do that. I laid out what we do to help them, by revisiting spelling strategies and making a difference between published work and draft work, and editing. I talked of using technology as a tool (we have a number of Spelling Ace devices in the room, and a load of dictionaries, and they are encouraged to ask an outside reader to help find errors).
Somewhere, though, I heard this inner voice saying that maybe I should just drop game design as a part of a writing curriculum, and focus on writing mechanics and spelling lessons. Maybe my classroom should return to the days of ELA as I remember it — the drills on skills. I even found myself shaking my head in agreement when one parent bemoaned how electronic devices are turning kids off from reading books. It’s true. It is.
And yet here I am, teaching and encouraging gaming.
I try to shake off this inner voice reservation with the conviction that I work many of those basic writing skills into any project, including gaming. They will be keeping a game design journal, making storyboards, writing a narrative project that guides their game, etc, — all of which will require finished/finalized writing that meet high expectations around spelling and grammar. I remind myself about the need for more visual literacy skills (all data from our state testing shows this as a major weakness with our students). I remember the way all of my students — four classes worth of sixth graders — were incredibly engaged in constructing a simple video game the other day. I keep telling myself that this is a good path to be on.
But I still feel this twinge of guilt. It must be a parent-thing. Or a teacher-thing, Or an adult-thing. Gaming can’t be learning if its entertainment, right?
Peace (as I return to the game),
Kevin
A Poetic Reaction to Occupy Wall Street
Nov 26th
(I have been trying to make sense of the possibilities for OWS from afar, and this poem seeks to capture the idea of someone on the outside, looking in. — Kevin)
Searching for the Revolution
Here in the square
all voices melt into hand signals
while the echoes of ideas transmit
from one to another to another as shooting stars
in the night’s descending darkness ….
…. handpainted signs strewn like litter
amid tents propped up like homes;
Slashing slogans mixed with fire
amid crowds of youth, mind and bones.
I circle the park
in search of you, knowing
you must be in there somewhere
with eyes ablaze, furious protests
unfurling off your tongue
as you feed on the chill of the night air
and the possibility of revolution …
…. walking, walking, talking, walking
as if I were yet another of your distant planets
circling the sun.
I’m in the clutches of the pull of gravity
edging me ever inward
to a place I find no comfort ….
but I just might find you …
Reading Matters: Boys and Role Models and More
Nov 26th
Check out this quote from David Remnick (editor of The New Yorker):
… the only way to get anywhere as a writer is to have read ceaselessly and then read some more. Pound (that rat) says somewhere that it is incredible to him that so many “poets” simply pick up a pen and start writing verse and call it poetry, while a would-be pianist knows full well how necessary it is to master scales and thousands of exercises before making music worthy of the name. Playing scales, for a writer, means reading. Is there any real writing that has no reading behind it? I don’t think so. — David Remnick (as quoted at AdvicetoWriters this morning)
I call your attention to that piece of advice because I opened up my New Yorker magazine yesterday and found myself staring at an advertisement from Little, Brown and Company, except it wasn’t an advertisement. It was a wonderful two-page spread of writing by author James Patterson, extolling the virtues of reading and encouraging parents in no uncertain terms to become role models of readers for their own kids. (I guess he targeted a few places – here is a version on the CNN website.)
“Let’s face it: most of us don’t realize it but we are failing our kids as reading role models. The best role models are in the home: brothers, fathers, grandfathers; mothers, sisters, grandmothers. Moms and dads, it’s important that your kids see you reading.” — James Patterson, in New Yorker
While I am not really all that big a fan of Patterson as a writer — although I know plenty of adults and children who are fans of his books — the fact that he composed and published such a powerful call to action for adults is admirable. He also narrows his point to boy readers in particular, noting that “boys can be a little squirrelly when it comes to reading, and what’s squirrelly about them needs to be praised and encouraged.” He suggests putting all sorts of texts into boys’ hands — magazines, comics, novels, joke books, informational books, and more. Patterson notes that there is a tendency not to value works like the Guinness Book of World Records, or Sports Almanacs. “Too often, boy-appealing books are disproportionately overlooked on schools’ recommended reading lists,” Patterson writes.
Yes. I agree, and the boys in my classroom are always picking up my graphic novels and my Book of Records texts and the various texts I have around sports (particularly skateboarding and football).
Here are some websites that Patterson suggests turning to for book recommendations:
- Readkiddoread.com (Patterson’s site for encouraging reading)
- Guysread.com
- Oprah’s Kid Reading List
- Dropeverythingandread.com
- Young Adult Library Services
Let’s get our boys reading, and let’s not forget the girls while we are at it, either. If we want our young people to become better writers, then we need them to become better readers. This is what David Remnick was getting at it. One of the fears and worries that comes up in many meetings with parents (and in conversations with my wife and I as parents) is how the “screen time” on devices is taking away time from independent, quiet reading. This shift in activity time management concerns me, and it should concern you, too, whether you are a teacher or a parent or a member of society. The question we are facing as teachers is how to find a balance between the emerging tech-centered lives of this generation while still teaching the understanding of reading and writing as a centerpiece for literacy.
All of it is important, and losing one of those threads, particularly the love of reading, is worrisome.
Peace (in the books),
Kevin
Introducing Literary Characters: A student podcast project
Nov 25th
We’ve been working hard on character traits with our independent reading, pushing into different ways to view the characters in the novels they have chosen to read. One activity is have students introduce a character to an audience. In this case, the audience is the world, as we used our iPods and Cinch to podcast their piece of writing about a character. I gave them a basic framework and an example of my own, and then they worked on the writing and then recorded their introductions.
Here is a sample mix of some of the student voices:
Our podcasts can be found over at our classroom home at Cinch.
Peace (in the sharing),
Kevin
Giving Thanks by Showing Peace
Nov 24th
A Simple Maze Task Offers Complex Lessons about Game Design
Nov 23rd
We’re still in the early stages of exploring Gamestar Mechanic as a place to learn about visual literacy and game design. Yesterday, I had my students “build” a simple maze game. Their task was to use bricks to create the walls, a single hero, a single villain, and one treasure chest somewhere in the maze. Gamestar makes it easy to build mazes. You choose your item and use your mouse to put it down. Hit “play” and test out your game.
But the lesson soon turned to one about the balance between making a game challenging and making a game too difficult to play. This is a crucial element of game design. If your game is too easy, the player gets bored. If it is too hard, the player gets frustrated. The key is to find that middle ground of being just challenging enough to inspire the player to try and try again, and eventually, succeed. The player has to have hope they can make it to the end of the game.
I brought this up a few times, particularly when one of my students took over my mac and began using the interactive board to build out her game. I let her, even though she didn’t ask, because the board is for them, not for me. And I found it interesting to watch her, as did many of the other students.
She was creating a very complex game, sweeping the pen (mouse) across the board to add many, many different things. She was working with the game designer in mind, it occurred to me. Across the room, a boy was deep in thought with his maze, carefully constructing the elements with the player in mind. His maze was carefully constructed. I liked his maze better because I was a player. I could see what I needed to do, and how I could win, even if there was a challenge to it. Her game had so many elements (she was experimenting and playing, which was fine) that I could not really focus on even where my player avatar was.
What I might do different: I probably should have had them create a paper version of their maze game first, and then shift to the Gamestar Mechanic site. That would have provided a blueprint for them. But, as with some things when holidays roll around, we were limited to our time and I wanted to give them some experience before the Thanksgiving break.
On another note, many students were disappointed they could not yet publish their games to the Gamestar site. But they need to finish their first “Quest” in order to gain that privilege of being able to share their own games with others. I like that, as it not only provides incentive to get through the first part of the Gamestar system, but the system itself (a graphic novel story with games built in) is constructed to teach them all about game design (fixing broken games, learning about difficulty levels, adjusting characters and items, etc.)
Peace (in the maze),
Kevin
Book Review: Diary of a Wimpy Kid – Cabin Fever
Nov 22nd
On the day I handed my 11 year old son the release of the newest Diary of a Wimpy Kid series – Cabin Fever — he was done within an hour and had passed it to his older brother, who was done with the book within 45 minutes. My youngest son took it up and told me he was “just reading the comics.” Well, I asked the older boys? Is it any good?
“There’s no story. Or at least, not until the end,” one boy complained.
“It had some funny bits. But I already forget what it was about,” the other added.
And so it goes. The excitement over the recent installment of a popular series inevitably leads to the eventual let-down of reality. Or it may be that my older boys have “aged out” of the mis-adventures of Greg Heffley.
I have long enjoyed Jeff Kinney’s work with the Wimpy Kid series (although I thought the movie was just dumb) and certainly, his success flooded the market with so many knock-offs that book shelves in book stores (the ones that still exist) are weighed down with text/illustration humor novels aimed at elementary and middle school readers. I have even used part of the “blank” book he put out a few years ago with various writing and drawing prompts for his readers. There’s some fun activities in there.
This latest edition to the series is, as my boys note, sort of a bit too much fluff and not enough story to hold the thing together. My students who ordered the book early and then devoured it … had similar reviews. And they were disappointed, particularly given the build-up within Scholastic (order now! wait five weeks!).
Which is not to say there are not funny moments in this book. Kinney’s too good to be a complete let-down. Topics such as playground safety in schools (Result? removing all playground structures), anti-bullying workshops (Greg feels sorry for the bully), gaming (the use of Net Kritterz is pretty funny satire at the state of gaming and commerce), nut-free cafeteria zones (leads to crowded tables for everyone else), nutrition in schools and the inclusion of graphic novels in the library.
But I wonder if Kinney needs another outlet for his humor and whether the Wimpy Kid has run its course. I am certain that Kinney will find his footing, though, and I remain a fan of his as a writer and humorous dude.
Peace (with the Kid),
Kevin
PS — by the way, did you see this great parody of President Obama and the Wimpy KId series in the Boston Globe? Check it out. It had me laughing so hard …. in a painful political way.
My Nominations for the Edublog Awards 2011
Nov 21st
- Best individual blog: I have come to look forward to Audrey Watter’s Hack Education (http://www.hackeducation.com/) posts. They are long, and deep, and I often need to allocate more than a quick read. I appreciate that she doesn’t need to shorten or dumb down her ideas around education. While some of the focus seems to be on higher education, her unflinching look at trends and ways to push traditional education in new directions is a delight.
- Best individual tweeter: Pam Moran (http://twitter.com/pammoran) is one of my favorite tweeters. Her insights into education as an educator, writer and administrator show a myriad of thinking paths, and she is responsive to others and as likely to share an idea as she is to ask for help. You can find her at Twitter at @pammoran
- Best group blog: The Cooperative Catalyst (http://coopcatalyst.wordpress.com/) is an interesting stew of ideas that really pushes up against many topics and ideas. What I love about the various writers at the Coop is how they are fearless in the things they believe in and yet, they open invite opposing views. Unlike some group sites, the Coop doesn’t ever feel insular in nature.
- Best new blog: Jeremy Hyler (http://jeremyhyler40.wordpress.com/) Jeremy is middle school teacher who tells it like it is,a and yet, even when he is being critical of himself or the system or even his students, he ends his writing on a positive note that indicates his blog-based thinking is leading to action and change. He’s also a fellow National Writing Project teacher.
- Best class blog: I am biased here, but I still look forward to the posts by a kindergarten teacher in my school — Gail Poulin — who chronicles her year with her young students in many ways. Her classroom blog – http://poulingail.edublogs.org/ – showcases the various elements of literacy learning, community service, inquiry projects and technology integration. As her colleague on the other side of the school, I am honored to share the same building as Gail. Plus, I get to see my future students in the early stages of their development as learners. Pretty neat.
- Best student blog: I am not sure this is a classroom project. It probably isn’t. But I love the book reviews that Corey gives at his Book Talk blog — http://coreysbooktalk.blogspot.com/ — and the more insights I have into what kids are reading, the more I can steer my students towards books that will interest them. I like how Corey has a book of the month and asks questions to consider about the books he is reading.
- Best ed tech / resource sharing blog: So many resource blogs have sprung up in recent years. But I still rely heavily on Richard Byrne’s Free Tech for Teachers (http://www.freetech4teachers.com/) for not only sharing his discoveries, but also for the way he frames the technology tools as a way for learning. His writing is as rich as the tools.
- Most influential blog post: I found Will Richardson’s blog post — My Teacher is an App (http://willrichardson.com/post/12686013800/my-teacher-is-an-app) — to be thoughtful and thought-provoking in the way he framed the discussion around online education and the possibilities and the dangers of that shift. What makes it influential to me is that it made me think of the issue in a new light, with the app metaphor … well, apt.
- Best Twitter hashtag: I loved this year’s Day on Writing’s #whyiwrite hashtag (http://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23whyiwrite). The posts and the tweets over the course of the day were just wonderful examples of how we write and why we write. The hashtag collection was overflowing that day, reminding us of the importance of writing in our lives.
- Best teacher blog: I enjoy the posts coming out of Jeremy Kaiser’s Web 2.0 Edu blog (http://web20edu.com/). It may be that our interests intersect a lot (stopmotion video, etc.) but I also find his thinking helps my thinking, and isn’t that the beauty of collecting RSS feeds from blogs?
- Best librarian / library blog: A Year of Reading (http://readingyear.blogspot.com/) with Mary Lee and Franki is such an insightful breath of fresh air, as they move between book recommendations and how to revamp a school library with technology and clusters of activity. They have created spaces, and this online space, that is informative and enriching.
- Best School Administrator blog: I think The Principal’s Page (http://www.principalspage.com/theblog/) is a good inside look into the world of the administrator. I suspect that many of us teachers don’t quite get the stress and pressure our principals are under these days as jobs are looked upon through the scope of data and graphs. This blog reminds us that there are struggled aplenty when you are in the front office.
- Best free web tool: I have to admit, I love Cinch (http://cinch.fm/) for its ease of use for podcasting for myself and with my students. With options for browser-based recording, mobile device apps and even via a cell phone, Cinch really is a great resource for finding your voice and adding it to the world.
- Best educational use of audio / video / visual / podcast: Teachers Teaching Teachers (http://teachersteachingteachers.org/) continues to be one of the best conversations around, and the step into using Google Video Hangouts added a new dimension this year. With topics right off the headlines (such as Occupy and more), TTT is a place to go for great conversations around teaching.
- Best educational wiki: The Cool Tools for Schools (http://cooltoolsforschools.wikispaces.com/) is a great resource, chock full of interesting links grouped by topic.
- Best open PD / unconference / webinar series: I took a course at P2PU (http://p2pu.org/en/) with Bud Hunt around the writing components of the Common Core. It was my first foray into an open online course, and I have to say, it was wonderful. There was an interesting flow to the discussions and the platform made it easy to follow along and jump into conversations.
- Best educational use of a social network: Youth Voices (http://youthvoices.net/) continues to be a model for students coming together to write and to share and to explore. This year, organizers Paul Allison and Chris Sloan have made a concerted push to add an elementary/middle school element to the site, expanding the possibilities even further.
- Lifetime achievement: Bud Hunt (http://budtheteacher.com/blog/) continues to get me thinking with his sharp posts, and inspiring me with his reflective practice. I just hope a lifetime achievement award doesn’t stop the person from continuing to share their best practices with us.
Make your own nominations for the Edublog Awards.
Peace (in the sharing of resources),
Kevin
Considering the Strength of Student Passwords
Nov 20th
I had an interesting conundrum this week in which a website that I brought my students into had a temporary bug in the security feature that did not compromise the accounts, but it did invalidate a series of security questions that would allow my students to access their passwords if they should forget them or if they were to get lost. Unfortunately, unlike most educational sites these days, this particular one does not have a master list of student usernames and passwords available.
So, the day after I realized the bug (which was fixed), I gave each student a piece of paper and had them write down their username and password for me so that I could make a master list. I had to explain that no one would have access to the list (a few looked nervous, which is good) and that it would only be if they forgot their password or username.
This weekend, I created my list and began to notice some trends around passwords that I never really paid attention to before. And given that I am developing a digital citizenship unit for January, I see now that “Password Education” is going to be part of those lesson planning. While some students did a nice job of mixing up letters and numbers in a way that would be difficult to be hacked, I noticed some other things:
- One student, out loud in class, announced that he uses the same password for every site. And then he began to list out the sites that he uses: Facebook, YouTube, etc. Another student, one of his friends, announced that was true and that he knew the password. Not a good idea, I told both of them. I suggested he change his common password, and vary it for various sites.
- One of the usernames in our site appears to be the phone number of the student. Yikes! The site is closed to the public, but still … I found that very odd.
- A few usernames were their real first and last names. Again, the site is closed. But I specifically said they should come up with a username that is invented. Maybe I did not stress that clear enough.
- In a few cases, the password was exactly the same as the username. That doesn’t do much good, does it?
- One student wrote her username and password in sharpie marker on the front cover of her binder. I noticed it when they were filling out my sheet. Not too secure, I told her. She covered it up with a book, as if that would solve the matter.
- One password was clearly the home address of the student.
- A couple of the passwords were only three letters. That’s not as bad as some of the above, but the more characters, the harder it is to hack.
Of course, these are sixth graders and their main goal is to be able to remember their usernames and passwords, so they go the easiest route possible. My job is to teach them and remind them how to keep their data safe, and their accounts secure, and along with a conversation this week about it, it will become part of my upcoming digital educational unit, too.
Here are two resources that are handy when talking about passwords.
First, check out this infographic. It’s a good talking point.
Second, check out this site – Password Bird – which creates passwords based on some basic questions, and mixing up the words. I am going to come up with sort of activity that forces them to invent a few possible passwords. Another site — Strong Password Generator — is good, but the passwords that come out of the engine would be difficult for my students to remember, I think, even with the memory hints.
But I like this information from the Strong Password Generator site:
- A strong password:
- has at least 15 characters;
- has uppercase letters;
- has lowercase letters;
- has numbers;
- has symbols, such as ` ! " ? $ ? % ^ & * ( ) _ - + = { [ } ] : ; @ ' ~ # | \ < , > . ? /
- is not like your previous passwords;
- is not your name;
- is not your login;
- is not your friend’s name;
- is not your family member’s name;
- is not a dictionary word;
- is not a common name.
What it comes down to is an understanding of WHY we have passwords in the first place. This year, I notice, there is less of an awareness of security of online sites with my students. I’m not sure why that is. Without stirring up too much fear and anxiety, though, I want to inform them of ways they can protect their data, and also (when it comes to social networking sites) their reputations.
Peace (in the password),
Kevin
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