Always ready to learn new things

I know. I know. We’re not really ending, we’re just beginning; I know that. I just wanted to get your attention.

Final thoughts are always bittersweet if we really look at it as the end point. I see this as a point of departure. I have learned a great deal; I have come to a clear understanding of the endless possibilities that come from web 2.0 and I see things now in a new way and with a new spin in some cases. I have enjoyed my blog journal more than I ever assumed that I would have; I have felt really pleased when I mastered a new tool; I have felt a great sense of satisfaction checking off my completed assignments; I have already worked on incorporating these new tools into some of our ongoing responsibilities and I have thought about changing the way we do some of them to make better use of the tools that I now know are available to us. It is the great sense of satisfaction that comes with learning and a real reinforcement – more than I could have known when we started – that I am truly always ready to learn new things.

So, whether it’s as simple as using Slideshow or Flickr or Delicious or Pageflakes; whether we use Poll Daddy or Doodle Poll, Creative Commons or my wiki; be it in a Voicethread or through a podcast, with the power of Library Thing or my Google Reader, these are all now a part of the tools of the trade going forward. One thing about learning: once learned, you can never go back to being unaware and you can, with the right spirit and drive, use that which you have learned so that you are never quite the same. Is that not the real joy of what we do in schools; does not the sense of unbridled discovery and the expansion of possibilities resonate with each of us who teaches because it reminds us of the absolute joy that comes from learning?

I never thought that I would say that I was sorry that we’re done. I have really enjoyed the new discoveries and I have a sense of the possible heretofore a bit lost in the muddle to too much to do with not enough focus and energy to really look into the details of these newfangled web options. No more. Now I know. Now I feel energized about using these tools to do what we do in a better, more effective, more powerful way.  Will some of it fade? Will some of the options be little used? For sure. But there are a few that will be used; a few that will be explored further; a few that will be the new “normal” and in that sense and for those reasons, I look back fondly on this journey of discovery and look forward to the continuing journey which is life: always ready to learn new things.

OK, I accept the logic, and I can see the value in Classroom 2.0 particularly, and, as a stretch, I can even see how Twitter has some value. In particular, Classroom 2.0 is one more refined and defined mechanism to share in a NING social network created to focus on web 2.0 and social media for educators. I found some of the entries interesting, and some of the presentations offered were quite clever and thoughtful. I might peruse it on occasion. As for Twitter, I have friends who are truly into it and here I have resisted adding one more portal yielding countless tweets all day –  coming with limited control about access to me and with a lessening degree of interest on my part in adding yet more to my seemingly unlimited access to information, emails, Facebook messages, social network connections, RSS feeds, Google Reader updates, Delicious bookmarks, and the myriad other electronic networks that I already belong to.

I am not against any of these connections and, if there is a specific interest in a particular topic or the desire to share, or if one works in a smaller school or a smaller educational community, then I think these provide for remarkable opportunities to reach out and form a powerful network of like-minded individuals. As a Head of School who never feels disconnected from my school or broader educational community in New York City, I have tended to use a more personal approach to networking but, alas, that has its limits too and these tools are powerful and out there to help. So, while I may not sign up for them at the moment, I will never say never. Two years ago, I swore off Facebook until I realized that our students and our thousands of alumni use it to communicate. So, will I end up being a Twitter fan? Will I be checking in with Classroom 2.0 on a regular basis? Do I plan to start a new social network with NING? I think not at the moment. However, more than anything else, this course has reminded me about connections that are possible and provided some insight about the possibilities. As a person who runs a school for young artists, athletes and dreamers of all types, I can firmly stand on the side of any process or opportunity that grows our sense of possibilities. In that sense, what I know now can never be taken back and will, no doubt, be a catalyst toward ongoing discovery, use and incorporation of these new tools going forward.

As I was away for two weeks on a glorious vacation in the South Pacific, I only glanced at stories that caught my eye. One specific story about an educator’s clash with the military’s recruitment office, from the Successful Teaching Blog’s RSS feed was interesting inasmuch as it had nothing to do with my life or school culture but it did focus on an attempt to get military recruiters to a school where kids might be interested to pursue that option for their future. In the ensuing nightmare of trying to get someone to pay attention and actually respond in a case where a pro-military educator was trying to get some recruiters to visit her school, the bureaucracy and paranoia on the other end of the phone proved how much work still needs to be done in terms of making the military more about people and less about protocol and defensiveness.

Second, while I was away, I was delighted to read from the New York Times  about Federal Judge Vaughn R. Walker’s ruling in California which deemed unconstitutional the absurd Proposition 8 repeal by California voters who somehow felt that they should be able to vote away people’s rights! It seems to me that people should always be able to vote to give more opportunities to others but that there should be no allowance for a vote that takes options away from people. Added to that was the pitiful presentation by the one incompetent witness who tried to reason that gay marriages would undermine traditional marriages, and cause untold harm and who could not give one factual backing for any of the charges that are spewed out by that constituency. Bravo to the Judge and hallelujah when the stay ends – hopefully without appeal – next Wednesday, August 18th at 5 PM. What nice news to come home to!

Despite the ads, which are truly annoying and make it hard to use this in a school setting without risking the whole controversy about having ads in an educationally directed document, I like the idea of a “bucket” approach to information. Increasingly we are learning of ways to amass information, package it, chose specific elements from the myriad options out there, and then present it in a collective, cogent, synthesized manner. I may not use this for school but I definitely can see using it personally as I like to package material and find a single source way of quickly reviewing lots of divergent resources under the rubric of an overall common theme. I did play with it at some length and it got my brain going at full throttle: I love to have an overview to things and this could end up being like a Bloomberg terminal, whereby all of the information that I chose about a specific area of interest or knowledge can be available to me easily and in one visual field.

Love the idea, sorry about the commercialization. For now, this is in the “personal use” file but I might find a way to use it, on a limited basis, in an administrative way, whereby I can apologize ahead of time to my colleagues about the ads but still have a way to send a lot of related information out in a single press of the “send” button.

Well, as my Google Docs word document mentions, I am just back from a two week, incredibly restorative, remarkably calming, powerfully spiritual visit – including scuba diving -  to the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. It was simply one of those lifetime experiences that will stay with me forever and my time there will be a source of reflection and a catalyst for continued discovery in life for many years to come. My partner and I spent time on a glorious island twenty or more miles off the coast of Australia, at a resort that was the single development on the island and which, inamsuch as they are in their off season, was quiet, barely occupied and stunningly beautiful. Here’s a tease for you as to what it looked like from the air (as you have to either fly there via seaplane, like we did, or take a boat from the nearest developed island, one hour away):

So, that’s where I’ve been and now, back at work and adjusting to the 14 hour time change and the 17 hour 40 minute flight home, it’s time to reconnect to the web and to work.

Google Docs is a powerful tool, for sharing information, sharing a prepared presentation, providing spreadsheets and doing so without having to send out lots of paper-laden materials. It has a sense of immediacy, allows for a remarkable range of options, entails few requirements for a new learning curve, and continues to remind us of the power of the web in terms of sharing, consulting, coordinating, and collaborating. How nice to get feedback about a new brochure easily and with a chronological record of changes, opinions or edits. How easy to send out a presentation for tweaking without having to physically carry or display to multiple individuals in a multitude of offices; how easy to update spreadsheet information or coordinate admissions or tuition aid checklists and materials. This is one more way that we can work together in an efficient, focused and timely way. As a Google Docs fan for some time, this is one more reminder to me to keep using the innovative methods featured in this course on a regular basis and to remind ourselves that the old way of doing things is neither efficient nor particularly efficacious.

It’s good to be “back to the future” after such a powerful connection to life.

Well, this was certainly not a hard one to spend time on! How many hours do we all spend on You Tube during the week, to follow up on something, to get archival information, to learn how to do something? I was fascinated but not surprised to learn that 20 to 30 million people access You Tube every day. Yikes.

I spent some time looking around (the problem with You Tube is that one thing leads to another and, all of a sudden, you realize that you’ve been watching things for an hour or more!) and chose a few ones to mention. First, on the professional side, as a Head of School, I looked at some videos about grant writing; we’re quite good at it at my school but there is always something to learn. I also looked at some videos about the new IRS 990 form, which was instituted in the past year or so and is both cumbersome and complicated. On the interesting side, I am about to go on vacation in the Far East, and, as I usually do in preparation for travel to a new city, I watched a video to orient myself to the Arrivals process at Singapore’s Changi International Airport. Nothing like knowing what to expect after a long flight. Finally, one of my fall back You Tube videos is how to tie a bow tie; as part of my duties at Professional Children’s School, I have to occasionally go to black tie events and, for the life of me, unless I watch it each and every time, I simply cannot do a good bow tie. For those of you who need to know, this is the best video instruction on how to tie a bow tie that I have found, which may explain why it has been viewed over 900,000 times!

There is a great deal that we can do with You Tube, whether from the angle of teaching for the classroom or as a mechanism to instruct relative to administrative functions, tax codes, our development efforts or even in terms of community relationships. As this course has constantly reminded me, these are tools that are useful for us to support the needs we have and the priorities we set. In that sense, this is but one more of many possibilities to consider as we develop our strategic plans for the future. You Tube is here to stay and has a massive collection of often finely produced entries that should serve as a catalyst for our own growth and involvement in this most important tool of teaching, of reaching out, and fully connecting with our constituents – whoever they might be.

One thing I will say is that compared to You Tube,  Teacher Tube has some work to do; I did look at a bunch of their videos and, on top of the annoying ads each time you watch one, there was a lot of poor quality production, with often really tedious presentations and the lack of visual aids. I think that going forward, if we continue to use this as a way to educate, we need to educate ourselves about how to produce a video that is engaging, interesting and holds the attention of a young person.  That’s a goal for all of us as we move forward with the introduction of these new techniques and as we work to fully engage the young people entrusted to our care.

First, I was really impressed again by Garage Band, which I do have on my MacBook Pro and which I have only dabbled with a little bit before this experience. Neat tool, lots of options, makes doing the podcast easy – and has lots of bells and whistles if one desires to do that. That being said, this was easy, although it hopefully requires just a bit of thinking before speaking so as to sound coherent and maintain a flow and tempo so that people listening will find it both agreeable and engaging. Another really great tool, especially for a Head of School to use to embed commentary, add emotion, and bind a community through voice or music. This made it clear to me that my previous Post 17, whereby I mentioned that I subscribed to the President’s Message from Arizona State University, is much easier to create than I originally thought and can be a very useful tool for schools, like PCS, where many of our parents are far away and might like to literally hear from the Head of School on a pertinent issue. That’s something that I want to pursue.

In any case, my podcast is in regard to how impressed I was recently as foreman of a criminal trial jury and the depth and care exhibited by my fellow jurors in their work and deliberations.

Of late, these tools have been really captivating and energizing because they are tools of connection; alas, wasn’t that the point of this course in web 2.0?

As one of those people who travel and who realized that I could save or have access to a broad range of topical podcasts, and watch them on my iPhone or iPod on an airplane or when convenient, I am certainly familiar with iTunes and the myriad podcasts available through their “store”, as there are a few that I tend to watch, mostly about travel. I think podcasts are one more effective tool for information sharing – particularly the video driven ones for my particular interests and style, as I am a visual learner if I have the choice.  I have noticed that some podcasts  like Dr. Weil’s Health Living series allow you to chose audio or video versions and, if a choice is given, as I said,  I always choose the video subscription. For this exercise, I did look through the list, particularly impressed by the education “store” at iTunes U. I chose two for subscription, at least for a short term,  as I am again concerned about the absolute avalanche of information that is constantly being added to my list of things to take “a glance at” or just look over. I’m still feeling that that list, for this course alone, is increasingly massive so one of my goals for the completion of this survey course is to chose effectively which of these many feeds that I will ultimately stay subscribed to. In any case, I chose Brown University’s Choices Education Program on the Russian Revolution (I took Russian in college and find the history of Russia particularly interesting); the Choices program is designed, according to Brown, as a mechanism by which they can “bring university scholars into secondary level classrooms”. That seems to be the crux of podcasts: an efficient way of learning about any topic of interest with good to excellent production values and on one’s own schedule. Welcome to the future of education.

My second choice for subscription is, in fact, an audio podcast,  the President’s Podcast from Arizona State University. I have a home in Scottsdale,  near the the University, which is a  central element of the life of Scottsdale and Tempe, so I thought it would be interesting to hear what he has to say on a regular basis. As a school head, I can see using these mechanisms to get the word out, to allow for a truly personal connection in addition to or as a supplement to our online correspondence. If the individual is articulate and a good speaker, this is an effective way to present the face, the voice – in fact, the real person – who is the leader in a way that is as compelling as good writing and which can be used – or staged – to the best effect. What a great way to stay connected and to put the institution’s “spin” on topics of importance in a personal and powerful way. Alas, one more way of truly bringing the leader of an institution to the broader community, adding a personal, real connection to parents and guardians, even those far away. That works for a university and it works for a school like PCS, where many parents have limited opportunities to connect not just with the words but with some sense of the person who is the head of school.  I’ll want to look into that.

OK, despite my earlier diatribe about web 2.0 overload, this is one fascinating site: Library Thing. How incredible in terms of information, in terms of sharing facts, details, suggestions, common interests, places to buy books, references to locales, genres, people who share the same fascinations, tag clouds, people with the largest libraries (OK, wendybell at 26,546 books) or books with the most copies (J.K. Rowling of Harry Potter fame at 355,257). Just about anything that you want or need is here so I was very impressed. In terms of kids who read – and even for those who find reading a challenge, this is one way to excite them, to find the “others” who like the same things, to share the glory or the pain. That’s good for kids, good for librarians, teachers, administrators, and just about everyone else who reads. We can find another with similar interests in what we are reading and, in that sense, bond and feel part of something more; we can find out about similar works to expand our own reading experience. For many a young person, for many an adolescent, for the elderly, those who need to bond even across distance, I see this as a great catalyst for information gathering and the gathering together of those with common interests which always makes one feel – no matter how lonely – part of something else and truly connected. So, kudos to the social nature of web 2.0 – for those who wish to use these tools, they can be invaluable. The central issue, as I commented about in Thing 15, is for each person to decide on the nature of their interests, the areas where they wish to share (or not) and to find an effective balance for the use of tools that facilitate and affirm rather than intrude and overwhelm.  Library Thing has piqued my interest and revived my sense of the value of web 2.o tools for those who wish to use the power of the web to support their interests and desires. Bravo!

The tools keep piling up; there is an occasional sense of overload about trying to keep these all in mind, and to find a way to utilize them as needed without overindulging to the point of too many bells and whistles and not enough substance. I find the idea of Delicious quite interesting; I love the tag analysis; I love the breadth of information; I like the ease of having one place to look for everything. I guess I am not as psyched about having one more thing that everyone can share and add to (although I do realize that you don’t have to share all of your bookmarks).  Between my RSS  feed library in Google Reader, my blog, my wiki space, my numerous email accounts, my Facebook page for School, my several phone numbers, both land and cell, tonight I am struck by the notion of feeling way too accessible and losing some degree of both privacy and protection from information  and feedback overload. My feeling is that when the course ends, my public persona is already out there enough not to have so many elements of James Dawson in cyberspace and web 2.0, and most of these extensions of me via the web are destined to be canceled.

That being said, I am delighted to learn about these options and I can imagine Delicious being useful in the work setting, and in that context I would, when time allows, reconfigure an account specifically for work as a possibility. It is a very convenient mechanism for keeping everything in one space; the accessibility to others is useful, the tag analysis – and especially the spatial power of a tag cloud – is very impressive and provides a great overview of the elements of any topic that is out there. There are certainly myriad connections to be made and, again, this is a very useful addition to be aware of so as to more effectively – as required – use web 2.0 going forward. So, for tonight at least, I am glad to know about one more tool but I am increasingly aware that – as is true for all survey courses – one need make choices about which mechanisms serve you well and to personally determine for which ones one is hoping for an interactive process and for which ones one is not.

With that as my commentary for tonight, you are free to see my few eclectic bookmarks and tags in my Delicious account.