Kevin's Meandering Mind
If you don’t live it, it won’t come out of your horn. ~ Charlie Parker
Upcoming WMWP Theme: Digital Writing
Jan 24th
Each year, our Western Massachusetts Writing Project develops a “theme” that focuses our work throughout the year. The thematic thread points us to readings we want to do together, inspires our writing when we gather together, and provides a lens for workshops and professional development opportunities.
Two years ago, we explored social justice as part of our work with the National Writing Project’s “Project Outreach” initiative. The theme had us questioning (in a positive) way how we were working to meet the needs of all the teachers in our area. We came out of the year with new Mission Statement that really set forth our ideals around the impact of teaching for social change.
This year, we have been working around the Common Core, which our state has adopted as its new curriculum framework. An upcoming technology conference (which takes place in conjunction with Digital Learning Day) connects digital composition with standards in the Common Core curriculum. At other times, we have dove deeper into the curriculum, noting changes that will soon be impacting the things and ways we teach. This spring, we will be looking hard at the way that the new assessments (PARCC for us) are shaping up, and how those tools are going to affect our schools.
We’ve decided that next year, our theme will be digital media and digital writing. We’ll be using NWP’s Because Digital Writing Matters as a primary text for discussions and then sites like Digital Is as a resource. Our WMWP Technology Team, which has about 10 active members, will be the leaders of the effort, and as the technology liaison for WMWP, this is exciting for me. I am hoping we can find ways to draw people into the possibilities of digital tools for their students, and find ways to showcase student engagement and student use of technology in meaningful ways.
The idea of a “theme”over a long stretch of time is valuable, and opens up a lot of possibilities. Too often, our work around professional development seems scattered.
Peace (in the theme),
Kevin
The Annual Navel-Gazing: Blog Stats
Jan 23rd
Like many bloggers, I am curious about who comes knocking at my door from time to time. So, at the end of the year, I like to take a peek at the data from my blog traffic. Maybe I do it to reinforce the idea that I even have visitors, or to gauge some impact of my writing in a small sliver of the world. Mostly, though, I have become interested in data and how to interpret it.
So, here is the big picture: My blog had 27,568 hits last year (of which 20,941 were unique visitors, meaning not folks who keep coming back — but I like those folks who do, of course. ) Other data elements are interesting to me, but maybe not for you. Still, here is a collection of analytics related to my blog in 2011. The screenshots come from this blog, and my site on Vimeo (for video sharing), and from Feedburner.
The post with the most hits? Nothing to do with education. Instead, it was my collection of short Twitter stories around love that I published for Valentine’s Day. Go figure!
I did notice that most of my visitors come via my friends’ Stacey and Ruth’s blog, Two Writing Teachers. I guess I owe them …
If you come visiting here now and then, I want to thank you.
Peace (in the data stream),
Kevin
Six Words To Capture Teaching
Jan 22nd
I saw this in my RSS feed yesterday from friend Larry Ferlazzo. It’s a writing activity perfectly suited to Twitter in which teachers are asked to write a six word essay that captures the essence of teaching. If you are on Twitter, use the #6wordessay hashtag. Larry is collecting some of the responses via Storify. The whole project evolved from a project that Michelle Rhee is doing with young people.
Here is what I came up with:
What’s yours?
Peace (in the mini-essay),
Kevin