Stimulus Disconnect

This was left in my mailbox at school yesterday. My "stimulus bucks"? Please. I've been at my school for 18 years, and the amount of money and services coming into it for students right now is laughable, compared to just a few years ago. Just where are these stimulus bucks, who is getting them, and what are they for? Does anybody really understand what is happening in US schools right now?

Today I received a special gift: a nonrenewal of my teaching contract in the mail. Here it is. A 28 year teaching veteran, I am one of 3,300 teachers in Seattle getting this. I am being offered a new contract for less money. I have 10 days to appeal this. Believe it or not, my state has a collective bargaining agreement. My union negotiates our contracts with the school district. Or so I thought.

It is the weekend, of course, so it's a great time have this happen... less media coverage and all that. The bare bones of the breaking story were here and here. Much has happened in the past few hours. My union told me the letter was coming. The district denied that it was mailed. It arrived today. I will try to add updates here. Here's the latest.

What a very sad drama in Seattle for teachers and their students. The disconnect is bizarre. It becomes so difficult to teach with enthusiasm, energy, and passion.

Believe!

Looking for inspiration? Check out #20 in the Boston Globe's fantastic Big Picture entry, The 2009 Kentucky Derby

Mine That Bird in last place, 18 horses ahead of him (most of them bigger), going around the first turn. A 50 to 1 shot, he won by nearly seven lengths in a breathtaking race.

Sometimes you just have to believe, against all odds and circumstances, in what you can do.


Photo credit: Jamie Squire/Getty Images

Aging gracefully

The Earth Day Groceries Project turned sweet sixteen this year. In human terms that's just entering adulthood, but in Internet years, well, we're talking ancient. Pleistocene, at least.

The years have brought changes to the website of course. It's now a 501c3 nonprofit (donations welcomed). There have been posters, patches, and free bags....

This year I fiddled with .asp pages and didn't break anything in the databases that hold thousands of records of participating schools. Couldn't afford to hire that part out this time. Still firing on all cylinders, fingers crossed...

But the biggest change came out of self preservation, when I stopped hosting pictures from schools on the web site. This was a huge deal for hundreds of schools - to get pictures of their kids/bags on the Internet, so it made me very sad. But, in eliminating picture hosting, I've been spared dozens of hours of work in the past few days.

So what to do... I should have done this months earlier, but I started up a Facebook Group and a Flickr Group, hoping people might put pictures there. Considering the lateness of getting the word out, I think response has been not too bad. Below is a slideshow from the Flickr Group, which contains 105 pictures, at this writing:

I believe these are moves in the right direction, e.g., keeping in step with the times and using the the tools and networking sites widely used by the general public. What does not feel good is that the vast majority of schools cannot access them (Flickr and Facebook), at least in the US. I don't know what to do about that. Maybe if enough teachers railed against their tech department filter watchdogs for a good cause, something might happen. But I doubt it. That part is discouraging.

But what keeps this activity going year after year, and brings me hope, is the excitement and enthusiasm that children bring to their communities with this activity - and the stories they share on the project website.

If you're worrying about the direction our world is going, or thinking there just is not enough goodness and caring in people anymore, take a few minutes and Read Reports on the project website. Click on any state, Canadian province, or any of the 35 countries listed there. Here are some examples:

Heather Stewart
Jack Fields Elementary
Humble, TX USA
We decorated 342 bags!
About our project: The students at Jack Fields Elementary were so excited to begin this project! It is a great way for our students to make an impact in their community. This project allows their voices to be heard...the fact that they are able to make a difference is SO powerful!!!!

Michele Pietrzak
St. James Sewickley
Sewickley, PA USA
www.stjamesschool.us/
We decorated 400 bags!
About our project: This was A HUGE success for our FIRST year of participation. The students loved decorating the bags. Our school is in a small community (a suburb of Pittsburgh, PA). The local grocer was generous enough to buy the paper bags for us to use since they don't regularly stock them. Earth Day is celebrated school wide among our students and staff. We had school t- shirts made for the occasion, had a big assembly, and did individual class service & clean-up projects within the community. WE CAN'T WAIT TO DO THIS AGAIN NEXT YEAR!

Gheban Liliana
scool Gen. I.D. Sirbu
Petrila, Romania
We decorated 150 bags!
About our project: This is the third year we participate in the Earth Day Groceries Project. The kids really enjoyed this activity. They picked one slogan that they wanted to design their bag around or on their pizza boxes (we decorated 200 pizza boxes in the project national-Pizza mesanger). The kids were very eager to show off their artwork and creativity with the rest of the community, so they got right to work! We invited the the local press Gazeta Vaii Jiului . They were glad to take part to our activity and to become soldiers of our Planet. Our great successes were to make students feel the necessity of living on a clean planet! Inst.Gheban Liliana ,Prof.Barbu Elena , Prof. Ambrus Georgiana and prof. Chinta Cipriana School Generala I.D.Sirbu-Petrila ROMANIA
submitted on 4/25/2009

Happy Earth Day

(posted to Tweeters, on Earth Day)

Most folks around here know Marv Breece as a fabulous birder, a great teacher, and an all around good guy. He's also a wonderful photographer and a very generous soul.

For the fifth year in a row, Marv has allowed his pictures to be made into specially resized desktop wallpaper for The Earth Day Groceries Project - the largest educational activity on the Internet.

My third grade classroom is currently encircled with some of the most amazing computer desktop screens you can imagine. There is something special about Marv's pictures. People walk into my third grade classroom and gasp.

Check them out - they're available in both full and wide screen:

http://www.earthdaybags.org/gswallpaper.htm

Thanks Marv, and Happy Earth Day everyone!

A Testing Tale

I started this yesterday, and it got way too long for a blog post - and I wasn't even a third of the way through all I wanted to say. So I will say less, include a few pictures, and leave it at that.

Preparation:
Getting ready for the WASL (Washington Assessment of Student Learning) started two weeks before we took the test. I was especially concerned about how well prepared my kids would be in math, using a "spiraling" curriculum. Then there was this number line fiasco.

The Test:
Well, in my third grade classroom, nobody cried, and nobody threw up. But I wish you could have seen the terror on the faces I looked out on as we finally got ready to start. It continues to disturb me greatly, the impact of this ridiculous testing on our young people. If this is not abuse.....

I was not allowed to look at the tests or their answers. I was not allowed to tell my kids if they were doing well. If I saw somebody accidentally turn two pages and skip a page, I was not allowed to tell them. Gotta tell ya, it was like going to Pluto to take a test.

The Art:
If the kids finished early (95+% of them did every day), I told them they could draw, period. With a pencil only, and only on 8.5x11 newsprint. I didn't want them hurrying through the test so they could get out their special markers or whatever, and have a really great time if they got done fast.

Towards the end of the week, I started putting up their "doodles" on a poster in the hallway outside our classroom. Some very interesting artwork was produced.

The Writing:
In the third grade WASL, kids take reading for 2 days and math for 2 days. In another attempt to salvage something from the experience, I asked them to write about the WASL. I gave them a little time to write each day after the test, and then I asked them to post all their thoughts from the 4 days of testing to their blogs on Friday.

Their writings about the WASL are all compiled on one page here. It's a pretty long page, and a few of the kids are experimenting with html formatting in a wysiwyg editor on classblogmesiter, but you'll get the idea.

The Snacks:
And hey, I'm not the only teacher who pulls out snacks at testing time! Check Doug Noon's great piece on testing in his classroom. I think my kids had it all over some others, in terms of snack quality, but you'll have to read what they said.

Technorati tags: wasl roomtwelve

My Bentwood Box, Chief Seattle

I'm incredibly honored to have this bentwood box in my classroom. It was made for me by Wes Felty, after he saw my original painting. Incredible gift.

I finally added a video Wes did a few years ago to YouTube and to Chief Seattle's Speech of 1854: Chief Seattle's reply to a Government offer to purchase the remaining Salish lands:


Thanks, Wes!

Shifting gears, finding encouraging signs

Today I found out that it may be up to six months before Sugar on a Stick becomes really usable on my XO laptops. I had been getting a little discouraged, and I didn't know if it was really going to happen. So I was relieved to know that it may work, eventually.

So I took a deep breath and started thinking about where I might go with Sugar on a Stick right now. I recalled an exciting time from a year ago where my classroom was the field test for a new piece of software for the XO called Classroom Presenter for the XO. It had been developed by students from the University of Washington.

I had written about that incredible experience, and I thought now might be a good time to see if their program would run on a PC running Sugar on a Stick.

I used an XO to be the "teacher", and Sugar on a Stick on my Thinkpad as a student. After being sure they were both on the same jabber server, both had the program loaded, and both had the slide deck loaded, we connected. The program worked flawlessly. From my little XO, I was able to direct the student computer to any slide. I also received immediately any response to questions or drawings on the slide deck from the student computer. I could unlock the student computer so it could go to any of the slides, and I could lock the computer, so it could see what I, as the teacher, wanted it to see again.

A couple of specs: the XO is running version 8.2, and Sugar on a Stick is the "beta" version. I used the server at jabber.sugarlabs.org. In theory, I could have an entire bank of classroom computers, or a lab, or computers scattered around the globe - to be engaged in an activity. The Sugar community is encouraging school servers, or hubs, which would be a much better idea with many computers involved. The XO has a built in Mesh network, which we used during the demo in my classroom, but it's not on Sugar on a Stick. We had 8 XO's engaged at once back then. (laptop images here are from the slide deck designed for our demo, converted from a simple PowerPoint presentation I sent to the Classroom Presenter developers)

One thing I was not able to try out was sharing a student "answer" to all of the others involved in the activity, but I bet it would have worked, as everything else did.

I continue to be amazed at the potential I see for connective, constructive collaboration out there. Monday I start talking with my kids and their parents about having a flash drive dedicated for their own Sugar on a Stick.

technorati tags: xo olpc sugaronastick sugar classroompresenter

What's wrong with this picture?

What's wrong with this picture?
Originally uploaded by mahlness

Good thing I have been told to take down this number line - that I was forced to put up - in my classroom.

The reason had nothing to do with the obvious error, which had gone undetected in my room for a year and a half.

High stakes testing to the rescue of a mandated curriculum. Good grief.

It makes you think

I took a picture of this after school in my third grade classroom because what was happening just blew me away.

This is obviously the Connect Four game. I was blue, and as you can see, I was about to lose...


There are several things noteworthy in this picture loaded with technology stuff:

• Dell GX 270, with 1 GB RAM
• Acer 19" monitor
• Ethernet switch
• wireless access point

Yet the thing that made this all possible is barely visible. It's a 1 GB USB flash drive, plugged in to the cpu right under the "1", on the right. That little stick was the entire operating system, apps, and docs for what I was doing with my keyboard and mouse on my honking big Dell.

The other computer I was playing against happened to be in my classroom, but it could just as well have been in Kathmandu. That other computer was an XO laptop (also running on a flash drive). Both computers were running Sugar, and they were connected to the same Jabber server on the Internet.

The XO was moving much more slowly, but I still lost. The record of that game is on the flash drives that were plugged in to those two computers. Those flash drives can be plugged in to other computers. Those flash drives can hold the apps and docs that their owners want on them. They call it Sugar on a Stick. There are some wrinkles to be ironed out, but....

this kind of leveling of the playing field really makes you think.

technorati tags: xo olpc sugar sugaronastick soas

Peeking under the hood

The past few days I've been in the midst of a technical challenge, and I have been at a loss about how to solve it. I have to admit, I do enjoy working out computer challenges. Emerging from a morass of missteps and frustrations, today I had a moment where I solved the technical problems, it all made sense, and I had a chance to glimpse into the future.

I have 5 XO laptops in my third grade classroom. Two of them are solar powered. I read the latest from the OLPC News and I follow Forum discussions closely. Now, we all know the XO started a revolution in mini laptops, and powering them via solar panels is also pretty cool. But these developments pale in comparison to what I am looking at right now.

Lately there has been a flurry about Sugar on a Stick - Sugar being the OS for the XO laptop. Long story short, I figured out how to load an entire operating system, along with application data from individual uses of programs, to micro media - flash drives and SD cards.

There are five computers in this picture, complete with operating systems, applications, history, documents, etc. The contents of an entire computer can be loaded on a bootable flash drive or SD card. Put it in your pocket, and boot it in another computer - and you have your computer again. It can run on a Windows computer or a Mac. To me, this is incredible.

What does this mean in my third grade classroom? First off, it means a time of exploration and problem solving. And fun. We all know "Lincoln" has a red X and O, but what if we put in a flash drive we call Jude2? That computer now is running a different OS, has different applications, and has different documents stored on it. It also appears unique to other computers sharing the same Jabber server on the Internet.

The implications are mind boggling, if you really go with it. For a couple of years I've had a classroom collection of flash drives kids could check out to carry data back and forth to school. But I've never had a whole computer on a stick. I can now carry 5 XO laptops on my keyring. But why stop there?

In theory (and it would not be hard), each student could have his/her own computer, which they could load whenever they used an XO (could also be loaded on other computers - but that will be another step...). Students could carry their own favorite applications, and their documents would be there as well. All on a 2GB flash drive. Really.

This is not the future, it's here now.

I feel like I'm only peeking under the hood of what's coming...

Technorati tags: xo olpc roomtwelve solar

Back off

I've had just about enough teacher bashing the last few days.

First, from Congress, to Arne Duncan, to media, it's open season on teacher unions. Clay Burrell has pointed out the free swings everyone seems to be taking at teacher unions - as the supposed cause of problems in the US education system.

Then there are those who just blame teachers directly. This one really bothers me because it lays the blame for failure to use new technologies in classrooms at the feet of teachers.

This incredible article in Education Week reports on a study - and leads with this - that teachers are the reason new technologies are not being used in our schools:

Teachers, for the most part, are not taking advantage of the tools that middle and high school students have widely adopted for home and school purposes,....

Wrong. We teachers are, by and large, not allowed to use new technologies in our classrooms. Good grief, people, look at school district policies. They are set by administrators and school board members, not by teachers.

Guess what, they're not set by teacher unions, either.

So I say back off, and get to work fixing what's wrong. Do not start by trying to fire teachers. We are not the problem. That's like trying to pin the world financial crisis on bank tellers.

Staying even

Lately it's been difficult getting around to posting here. Part of it is the increasing load at school, and part of it is that Twitter and other social networking forums, like Facebook, also allow me to publish my thoughts. Shorter posts, for sure, but it's so much easier and quicker to say something or make a point.

Not only have my ways of expressing myself changed, but my thoughts are read by different audiences. Here are some real modest personal stats:

• A little over 300 follow this blog via rss (as far as I can tell, as there is more than one feed)
• 270 people follow me on Twitter (went up by 7 while I wrote this)
  
• I have 135 friends on Facebook

It would be impossible to tell how much overlap there is between those three groups. My best educated guess is that 30 to 40 people are on all three of those lists. Easily 90% of them are educators, I am pretty sure. Would like to see a Venn diagram right about now...

What's the point of all this? Well, I've been reading lots lately about social networking, much having to do with Facebook.

• "Social Media is Here to Stay... Now What?" - danah boyd, a must read
  
• The Way We Live Now - Growing Up on Facebook - NYTimes.com
• Kari Henley: Facebook And Kids: Are Their Brains Ready for Social Networking? - Huffington Post panic
• Privacy Settings Every Facebook User Should Know - valuable common sense

And Twitter seems to be making headlines of its own:

• Free Technology for Teachers: Seven Ways to Find Teachers on Twitter, which led to:
• twitter4teachers - a wiki. I started following many elementary folks from this today. I need to remember to do this more often, and not remain so passive about my PLN.
• Keith Olbermann on YouTube: Twitter is the Worst Person(s) in the World
• Even my own school district had something to say about Twitter the other day...
  

What does all this mean to this third grade teacher trying to teach and prepare his kids for the rest of their lives?

Not sure, except to say that if I do not at least try to stay even with the kids I'm teaching, in terms of understanding the technologies so entrenched in their lives, I don't have a prayer of providing a meaningful or relevant educational experience for them.

And as their teacher, I should be doing a lot more than just staying even with them.

Reasons to be in a place

There are reasons we move to a new place, and then there are the reasons we stay. They are often not the same. I moved to Seattle in 1973, right out of college. This is a big part of why I stay:



I'm sure this hits me so hard now because of family, so very far away. I just sent a birthday gift to my brother in Connecticut, and flowers for my mother-in-law's funeral in Kansas.

And then this beautiful little video comes along. Take a minute (literally) and watch and listen. It's nice in full screen mode...

The power of a place. It makes you wonder and think about all sorts of things.

Credits: Video by Christopher Boffoli, with thanks to the West Seattle Blog for pointing it out.

For you, Barb

Barb, we miss you like you can't believe. Like the kids say, please come back.



For everyone else; Barb Bailey is the music teacher at our school, and she is fighting valiantly to regain her health. She has taught across the hall from me for many, many years.

Whenever I open my classroom door, I miss the beautiful sound of children singing.

Missing Our Moms

Today my wife's mother passed away. Sarah Jean Currier was a beautiful woman, and she will be missed by many.

I sit here in Seattle, shaking my head, while I think about losing my own mom three months ago.

Janeanne is now there with her family in Kansas. I know the grief she is going through. It is painfully fresh in memory.

All I can think at this point is to be thankful for having had such wonderful moms. We were both pretty lucky, I think.

Information flow

I thought about titling this Information Overload, but the issue is not simply one of amount - but of access. Whenever I log on to a computer, which is several times a day, on up to three different computers, I start these apps:

• email - I use Outlook, have it configured to access 4 accounts
• rss - I use Bloglines, monitor 159 feeds
• Twitter - following 183
  
• Facebook - 115 friends
  

Four different applications, with Twitter and Facebook at very modest levels of involvement. I get different things from all these of course. I should mention I am on several email lists (Edtech, wwwedu, classblogmeister, ednet, tictech, ahptsa). Then there are the work emails: "All Staff" and "Teachers" lists for my school.

So this is a lot of information, sure. But I have managed it fairly well, until recently. These days, I don't know where to start. The usual sequence was: email, rss, twitter.

Now there is Facebook, and it's #2, right after email. And I am spending a LOT more time there.

I'm sure this happens to people all the time - an infatuation or fascination with the latest application. So now it is Facebook with me, but it feels different from past experiences with other applications. Here are some past "flashes in the pan" of my attention:

• Diigo
• MySpace
  
• Nings

There are some obvious reasons for the ascension of Facebook in my Hit Parade.

When I built my network of first 100 or so Friends, it was made up of educators, musicians (related to my wife's career), and local folks.

Then somebody brought up my high school rock band from the 60's. One connection led to many others, and all of a sudden I'm making contact with a group of people who are about to have a 40 year reunion. Many of them are new to Facebook. Then there's the rock and roll band scene - on the other side of the country. The lure of that is hard to explain, but it's undeniably strong. I went to school in Manchester, Connecticut - some 2,500 miles away from Seattle, where I have been since '73.

Why is Facebook working for me where other apps fell short? Well, it's a very good aggregator of my work. My Twitter posts appear there automatically. Same for my uploads to Flickr - and posts to this blog. Then there is the the ability to follow the activity of all friends right on Facebook or through Bloglines. Tonight I just had my first chat on Facebook - somebody dinged me. I wasn't even sure how that would work. It was pretty easy, actually. I fully expect to have video chat, skypelike, in the near future (is it already there?).

The other reason it works so well it that it's the current hot social networking application. Can't remember what Clay Shirky had to say about it last year, maybe I need to go back and take a look... Myspace, Diigo, and Nings are great, but their time as a useful tool has come and gone - at least for me.

I will not be surprised if Facebook fades soon and something else comes along to take its place. But for now, it is #2 on my Hit Parade of apps I open whenever I start up one of my computers.

"99 pictures of friends on the wall, 99 pictures of friends..."

Facebook friends. I'm finally on the cusp of triple digits. This comes as I'm reading Dean Shareski's Control is a Worthless Pursuit, where he rightly questions even trying to control our kids on the Internet - in reponse to this story about a school district in Wisconsin doing its best to stay even with a societal shift. I hope they give it up. Not only is it worthless, but it is a wasteful use of resources that should be directed not to control, but to teaching, leading, and guiding.

So here I sit at 99 Facebook friends. BTW, none of them is a student of mine. I am a third grade teacher. But I do get emails from my students, yes I do. Time to wake up.

Technorati tag: facebook

A Poem

A brief affair with a bottle of Elmgrove Stout
by Chris

She was pretty,
well proportioned,
sensuous one could say;
good body sharp aftertaste.
Well worth the time
spent in dalliance.

When an Irishman writes a poem in response to a stout you made and shared, well, it's a good feeling. From a dear friend of many years in Lincoln Park. Thanks Chris.

NCCE and a couple of days in Seattle

The last few days I've been on mid-winter break, that meaningless week of vacation recently added to our school year. Thursday and Friday I tuned in for a virtual expience of NCCE, happening in Portland. Thanks to a few twitterers and Jeff Utecht, I think I got a good picture of the event, often as it happened.

Thursday took me into downtown Seattle, in search of brewing supplies (Market Cellar Winery), and Indian cooking essentials (The Souk). Taking the bus is a piece of cake, a straight shot from our home in West Seattle, and I get a chance to get in touch with downtown, which I do not do often enough. With shopping successful, I headed back home for some good stuff from NCCE. Unfortunately, my feeling of the day, for what I was able to tune in to, was pretty well summed up in NCCE Day 1.

On Friday it was another beauty of a day in Seattle. Hoping to tune in to a NCCE Twitter gathering, I headed in to school with a buddy who was able to open the building, all prepared to make some headway (or more realistically, serious catching up). Thanks to the West Seattle Blog, and their Twitter feed, I got news of orcas in Puget Sound - less than five minutes from our school! We jumped in the car and headed off to Lincoln Park - where we ran into Mark Sears, on his way out of the parking lot, in a hurry, and hauling his boat. He's the Man, knows and has tracked the pods in the Sound for many years. We followed, as best we could. We did get a peek at them WAY in the distance, from the Alki Lighthouse. We drove a little farther and saw Mark heading way off into a fog bank - where we again did see distant glimpses. Still very, very cool. There is some video shot from a helicopter that's amazing. I guess the numbers seen in the Sound that day had not been seen in several years.

So I missed the Twitter gathering. Caught a couple of presentations on video (thanks Jeff). At the end, I was left nodding my head in agreement as I read NCCE Day 2.

Just today I got word of something that sounds much more on the money for where my interests and passions are now: The NCCE Constructivist Celebration. It's close, inexpensive, and well, there's this guy Gary Stager speaking. Think I better go....

Orca image credit: Tammy Wooley
Technorati tag: ncce

Still here, mostly...

It's been one of my longest blog post droughts ever, three plus weeks since I wrote here. Life goes on, I still have a job, and here's a little update on this and that, where my head's been and where it is right now...

• I am catching up in my third grade classroom. I missed a couple of weeks of school before Christmas because of the death of my mom, and several things did not happen as usual. In a classroom where every step is based on every previous step, it's been rough finding my way back at times. We are not where I'd hoped we'd be in blogging (writing in general), multimedia (PowerPoint and video production), the use of our XO laptops - and calendar events have raced by without enough time being given to them. My kids are a really nice bunch, and I always feel better when the 9:00 bell rings. And spring is right around the corner....
  
• My school was spared from being closed. But there was serious damage done to our reputation, good name, and self esteem. More fallout is headed our way, and some of us are trying to figure out how to stop the bleeding. It is gut wrenching at times.
  
• I had to cancel my preso (about XO laptops in the classroom) at NCCE 2009 in Portland. I was really looking forward to this one, but money, or lack of it, was the cause. I hoped for local support and came up empty. Makes me 0 for 4 in funding for my recent conference presos (2 regional, 2 national). Oh well, time to move on...
• Tomorrow I'll be heading in to school during our break to do some serious maintenance on my classroom compuers. This is way overdue, and I'm looking forward to getting in there and getting them all tuned up. They (10 desktops and 5 laptops) have held up remarkably well over the last year and a half - although I just had a cpu fail last week....
• I've been buoyed recently by reading some thoughtful posts from edtech bloggers, and listening once again to Sir Ken Robinson (yes, I have the book on order).
  
• A couple of weeks ago I restarted the tictech email discussion list. Now this really felt like a one step forward, two steps back move in terms of edtech innovation, but it seems to be where the local school scene is most comfortable. When I stopped the list a year ago, I started up a Ning in its place. There was an initial flurry of activity, but then really nothing. I hope to restart much some needed (I think) local edtech conversations - via email. *sigh*
  
• Last, I just got a comment on a post from over 2 years ago, Is this SSR, 2.0? I'm amazed at the legs that little post has had. It bothers me that something I've been doing for so long, something my third grade kids just take for granted and do so naturally- still sounds so foreign, and even unusual to many people. Maybe it's more widespread now, but my hunch (supported by a recent post from Will Richardson) is that silent reading from computers is still seen as daring and risky... I suppose I should post an update...
  

1:1 classroom, at last

This just kind of snuck up on me. I've fantasized over the years about a 1:1 computer/student ratio in my third grade classroom. Yesterday it happened.

I've had lots of computers for the kids to work on recently, but there has always been this 1/2 on - 1/2 off dance that I've done to do to give all the kids equal access. This is clearly one of the biggest obstacles facing classroom teachers when they consider how they'll use their handful (if they're lucky) of computers. I've worked hard to have more than a handful lately, but I do remember those days. On the right is our ONE, in 1994....

On Friday I took a few minutes to outline three writing options they had. The goal was publication of articles on their blogs or comments on other blogs. So I sent them to their computers:

• 12 went to Dell multimedia desktops, nice ones
• 4 went to Dell Latitude laptops, wireless of course
• 5 went to XO laptops

The tough part was deciding which students should get the XO's. Most of the kids would like to use them, but I chose those who I thought could write the best off the tops of their heads, without being able to rely on pulling previously written work from their folders on our server, and without the benefit of all the help of MS Word - autocorrect, spellcheck, etc, etc. They almost always write in Word first, and then copy/paste to their blogs. The XO's do have a Linux version of Firefox, so at least they have a basic spellchecker...

So they wrote. They revised, they brainstormed, they drafted, they rewrote, they edited, and they published. Not a single pencil or piece of paper was used in the process. And they were in a third grade classroom in a public school.

I know this happens elsewhere, but I've got to say it was a rewarding time when it came to my classroom. I believe the kids get it too.

Although several kids also wrote about other things, these were the three topical writing options I gave them:

• Dear Mr. President, 2009
  
• I Have a Dream, 2009
• Inauguration, 2009
  

Oath of office

Oath of office
Originally uploaded by mahlness

Barack Obama takes the oath of office and becomes the 44th US president, as my third graders in Seattle spontaneously rise for the moment.

Some raise their hands with their new president, some hold their hands over their hearts.

2008: 12 months, 12 posts

There are many ways to sew up one's feelings about the passing of another year, and I suppose this has been done by others as well, but here's what I've decided to do... choose 12 posts from this blog, one from each month of 2008. My goal starting out is that they all be technology related. We'll see how that ends up.

This is a long list, and I wouldn't expect enybody to stay and read through all of these - so, if you're looking for just a couple, I recommend Instincts and XO in the classroom - the whole story

Click on the name of the month to see all posts from that month, click on the linked blog post title to go right to my pick for the month.

• January, 2008: OLPC in the Classroom It is really, really amazing for me to realize that at this point I just had one XO laptop - and had no idea what to do with it.
• February, 2008: A Tale of Two XO's If this post ends up being all about XO laptops, so be it, but I'm hard pressed to find another post in February that captured the sheer magic of that special time.
• March, 2008: Third Time's the Charm I presented at NCCE in Seattle, on blogging, took some presentation risks, but my classroom came through spendidly. This February I'm headed to Portland for NCCE again, to offer "XO Classroom" - which was really where my head and heart were at in Seattle, 2008...
• April, 2008 Swamped, but Saved Slim pickings this month because of Earth Day, but the kids saved the day - once again.
  
• May, 2008: Instincts Simply one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had in the classroom - with XO laptops, UW students, groundbreaking software premiere...
  
• June, 2008: How do you say Thank You Student blogging, thank you note for a loaner XO, and kids using a wysiwyg interface
  
• July, 2008: Ednet is now Ednet2 A different piece of my Internet persona - email lists, moderating, owning. "Rescued" Ednet.
  
• August, 2008: XO in the classroom - the whole story Every post I'd written so far (25 by then) about the XO experience - listed, linked, and summarized.
  
• September, 2008: Blogging, Personal Politics, and the Classroom Teacher Wrapped up in presidential election politics, I wondered how far I could go in my classroom.
  
• October, 2008: XO Upgrades and Updates Took a risk, financially, and decided to go for some teachable moments, trying to power 2 of our XO's via solar panels.
  
• November, 2008: S.O.S. Unbelievably, Arbor Heights Elementary School was put on the closure list in our district. Jury still out, but the outlook is not as bleak now as then...
  
• December, 2008: Arbor Heights - give back from the net Continuing the struggle to validate our school's existence, I asked for help. Still looking for and compiling supportive comments from over 14 years on the Internet, we would welcome more, here.
  

XO Laptop grows on

Thanks to Janice for pointing out this moving TED piece from Nicholas Negroponte. In Columbia, December, 2008:



We are so lucky in the US. Curiously, there are a few of us teachers who want to use these laptops with our kids right here in the good old USA, because we see the potential, too. Here's a post where I documented and linked all the writing I did about using the XO in my third grade classroom over the past year.

If you are a G1G1 donor and want to donate the XO you got to a US classroom - that will use it and appreciate it every day - drop me a line. - Mark

technorati tags: xo olpc g1g1

"I am changing my (school's name) to Chrysler"

Bailouts. The auto industry, banks, investment corporations. How about schools?

Seattle schools are in financial trouble. The district right away announced which schools were going to close. Aside from the fact that this would recover much less than 10% of the projected deficit, the anguish and uproar has torn communities apart.

The following op/ed piece was just published in the Seattle Times by a colleague, a middle school teacher. If you know the Tom Paxton song, now would be the time to start running it through your head. In part, Jesse Hagopian wrote:

With the public experiencing bailout fatigue, corporate America is attempting to repackage its image as some kind of militant student leader taking on the powers that be. In a virtual Chevy-Corvette-turns-Stokely-Carmichael, General Motors declared, "Mobilize Now!" on its Web site, GMfactsandfiction.com. "Tell your U.S. Senators and Representatives that support for the U.S. auto industry is in America 's best economic interest."

I am going down to Washington, D.C., to ask for a handout. My industry is falling on hard times and needs at least $25 billion to cover basic operating costs — but I assure you the emergency aid isn't just for me and my associates. The truth is, my industry is too big to fail, and if it were to go under it would have disastrous effects for the economy and millions of Americans lives.

No, I am not an executive from one of the Big Three automakers (General Motors, Chrysler, Ford) — I teach social studies to 13-year-olds and the public schools are my "industry."

And if "letting GM go is a terrible idea" — as General Motors Corp. CEO Rick Wagoner recently warned Congress in his plea for a bailout of his failing company — then letting our schools fail in the wake of free-falling state budgets would be catastrophic.

.....The argument for letting kids cut to the front of the funding line — ahead of bankers and auto-industry executives — is clear: Kids are more valuable than Cadillacs.

While spinning rims and glossy chrome on an Escalade embody the image of wealth, America's pupils are far more valuable. Allowing our schools to be defunded state-by-state would have a catastrophic effect on our economy and our society.

According to Alliance for Excellent Education, a Washington, D.C.-based policy and advocacy organization, if the nation's students who dropped out of the class of 2008 had graduated, the U.S. economy would have benefited from an additional $319 billion in income over the course of their lives.

.....This appeal to mobilize masses has the shrill tone of a teacher yelling at a disinterested class, given that the Big Three just cut back health-care benefits for some 2 million employees.

If we can keep the funding for the music program, students across America should be taught the old Tom Paxton song that goes:

"I'm changing my name to Chrysler / I am leaving for that great receiving line / When they hand a million grand out / I'll be standing with my hand out / Yes sir, I'll get mine!"

Thank you, Jesse. If you don't have that old Paxton song in your head yet, here's a version by Arlo Guthrie:



And of course Arlo and Tom have been busy updating the song lately....

To roomtwelve.com

Hi third graders at roomtwelve.com! I'm leaving you a note here because I can't post any articles at our classroom blog right now. That's the bad news - the good news is that YOU can still send in articles! Once you log in, things will look a little different, but I'm sure you can find your way around. Here are a few things you can write about:

• Write on your blog anything you want to share with others: Christmas, being snowed in, sledding, what you got from Santa, and so on.... at least 2 paragraphs on "Vacation Thoughts" gets you extra credit in writing!
  
• Lincoln wrote this on his blog. Leave a comment there if you can answer his question (by the way, Julian correctly guessed the last mystery bird that I posted):
  
  Merry Christmas bird quiz!
  

  Well, it's snowing in Seattle again, and I'm a little tired of it all. I mean, where's all the grass, anyway? Here's a picture Mr. A. just took. If you know what kind of bird this is, leave your guess as a comment to this blog post. Thanks! - Lincoln (Mr. A's cat)

  
  

• Look for a new assignment at roomtwelve.com, or here, if I can't write articles on the classroom blog.... It will appear on the last day of 2008.

I hope you are all enjoying your vacation. I am so sorry I was not with you for those two weeks before vacation started. Your substitute (guest) teachers all said you did a very nice job - which was a very nice Christmas present for me - thanks!

Merry Christmas! - Mr. A.

Christmas Eve, 2008

(a year later, glad I took the time to reconstruct the events, I can now post this - 12/19/09)

It's calm now, but the last three weeks have been pretty wild. My mom broke her hip Thanksgiving morning. She hung on valiantly, but she passed away a week ago. Two weeks ago I dropped everything and flew back to Ithaca, NY to be with her - and my brother, sister, and dad. We had some very intense and meaningful moments. I felt lucky to be there with her.

There were many, many hospital visits, mostly to the ICU. Three days into my visit we moved my dad into a nursing home with an Alzheimer's unit - and we moved his assisted living furnishings into storage. It will be a much better home for him now, with specialized nursing care looking after his needs.

The past two weeks were difficult, to say the least. I drove my brother back to Connecticut hours after Mom's funeral, to stay ahead of a honking big snowstorm. I only stayed at his place one night to avoid the same storm, arriving at an airport motel in a blizzard.

The next day was a 19 hour travel day from hell. Managing to stay one step ahead of cancellation, waiting on the runway because the next airport was suddenly shut down, missing the connecting flight and barely getting on a later one, standby. Then not making it to Seattle because of the snow, landing in Spokane, waiting, waiting... landing in Seattle at 2 AM. The final leg got me to my home in the wildest taxi ride I've ever had, driving through a foot of snow on unplowed roads. I carried my luggage the last half mile, in my running shoes. At 4 AM I called my wife from the from our front yard, "Honey, I'm home, how about opening the door?"

That was two days ago. Seattle is in the grips of the lengthiest snow event seen here in decades. We live midway up a very steep sidestreet hill (never plowed). Our car has not been out of the driveway for 11 days. We walk 3 miles to the grocery store. My back is killing me from repeated shoveling.

Some things did not happen this year. My wife and I did not get away to Iron Springs, on the Washington coast. We do not have a Christmas tree. The Men's Cookie Exchange did not happen. In Seattle, school was canceled for the last three days before vacation started. I missed being with my class of third graders very much. The two weeks before Christmas is such a very, very loaded time - like extra dark chocolate - almost too intense, but unforgettable. We'll do our best to recreate and rebuild in January.

But it's Christmas Eve. Finally. My wife is baking cookies to include in our annual beer and cookies bags passed out to our neighbors on Christmas Eve. One of the cookies will be Mom's toffee bars (see my recipe on the Food Network). I take care of the ales, brewed some time ago.

More snow is forecast tonight. The wind is whipping up a 35 degree rain/snow mix right now, and we hope the power stays on as it changes back to snow.

We will all move on from the past two weeks, but it is important to remember. Here's to my mom on Christmas Eve. Here's to my family.

Mom

My mom passed away December 14, 2008 in Ithaca, NY. I was fortunate to spend her last week with her. Although most of the time she was in a semi-coma, my sister, brother, and I were lucky to share 36 hours with her, where she was definitely "with us". Love you, Mom. - Mark

Snowy journey

Friendly's
Originally uploaded by mahlness

The scene at the right is a typical one for some parts of New England. I took it yesterday while out for a walk from my airport strip motel near Hartford, CT, trying to get back to Seattle. Every year I watch news stories of airport travelers stranded at airports during the Christmas holiday travel season - and I always say, boy, I'll never do that in a million years. Well here I am, a part of the craziness. Heading off to the airport, all flights on time, so far...

Arbor Heights - give back from the Net

If Arbor Heights Elementary School's activities on the Internet have made a difference to you over the past 15 years, please consider sending a short note our way. We are compiling thoughts from educators around the world to present to our school board as they think about whether they should keep our school open or close it forever. A few highlights from our Internet history:

• it was the 9th elementary school in the world with a website
• the website appeared in Bill Gates' bestseller "The Road Ahead".
• it founded and still coordinates The Earth Day Groceries Project, the largest educational activity on the Internet: http://earthdaybags.org
• the website hosts the only complete archive of "The Random Thoughts of Louis Schmier", http://www.halcyon.com/arborhts/louis.html
• the website hosts The Jr. Seahawk Newsletter, "The oldest continuously published elementary school student newspaper on the Internet", http://jrseahawk.com
• the website continues to lead in innovation, as it officially converted to a wiki in the summer of 2008 - http://arborheights.com
  

If you'd be willing to briefly share how Arbor Heights has made a difference for you, please send an email to me at mahlness@halcyon.com, leave a comment right here, or leave a comment at http://savearborheights.com Please include your full name, location, and affiliation.

All schools are special, that is a given. I believe Arbor Heights Elementary School stands out in a very unique way. My hope is that it will be preserved in part because of that.

People often talk about giving back to the Net. I suppose this might be giving back from the Net. Thanks in advance! We'll let you know how it turns out. - Mark

Technorati tag: savearborheights

Distance Teaching

It is amazing to be here on the East Coast of the US, and also be able to teach my students back in Seattle the finer points of writing. My third graders each has a classblogmeister blog, at roomtwelve.com

Being back east for a week, helping out with family issues, I still get to publish and offer feedback on my kids' writing. I only wish I could share the wildlife with them, like this tufted titmouse I saw at a feeder outside my sister's house in Ithaca today. Well, I guess I can, a little...

roomtwelve

Students Blog about Arbor Heights

Just posted at savearborheights.com:

The third graders in Room Twelve at Arbor Heights have been writing about the proposed closure of our school.

Their articles are grouped together for easy reading, at "Save Arbor Heights". The list of posts is sure to grow, so please bookmark the site and check back later. These young writers would welcome comments from one and all, so feel free to respond to them individually (the blog is totally moderated).

Many thanks,
Mark Ahlness,
teacher, grade 3

If you have a story or comment about the influence of Arbor Heights, or what Arbor Heights Elementary School has meant to you, please leave a comment here or there. Thanks! - Mark

savearborheights.com

My school is being recommended for eviction. Community members gathered tonight - to understand, to plan, and to support each other:



Our blog: savearborheights.com

Technorati tag: savearborheights

A Thanksgiving to Remember

As I begin, on the Sunday night at the end of our Thanksgiving Break, Wednesday seems so long ago. That was the day the kids came to school having heard their school was recommended to be closed (really, evicted from our building). This is part of what I emailed to the parents of my third graders that evening:

We went back to class, and I said I would do my best to answer questions. I did my best, but it wasn't easy, and there were kids in tears as they began to think about not going to school at Arbor Heights next year. There were good questions, and a few comments. One student recalled being at Roxhill 2 years ago as they went through the same thing. Somebody asked about their blogs (bless their hearts - yes, they will be there for them).

The question that I could not answer was, "Mr. Ahlness, if Arbor Heights is such a great school, why do we have to leave and let another school have our school?"

Thanksgiving Day was not bad, weather-wise, for Seattle. We got together with a good friend, did the walk in Lincoln Park while the turkey cooked... but my mom was on the other side of the country (Ithaca, NY) in an ER with a badly broken hip. At 84, and with heart issues, it was not good. Anybody who thinks it might be easier to be far away at a time like that, well... it's not.

Friday brought the uncertainty of whether my mom was ready for surgery, with the realization that our toilet had to be replaced, immediately. Total Joy. We live in a one bathroom house. But - only four hours from the decision to remove/replace, to being able to flush a high end beauty - was not too bad. Unfortunately, my back will be reminding me about the day for some time...

Saturday put my Mom into surgery, finally. On the phone with my sister throughout the day. It was one of those days when the phone rings and your heart leaps into your throat - it was nip and tuck, but she made it.

Sunday was a huge day of email and blogging - all working on fighting my school closure recommendation. Many emails with ptsa board members, community folks - and blog work. I am on two more blogs than when the break started.

• On the morning the school closures were to be announced (Tuesday), I started a blog, bought a domain name, and set up domain forwarding to the blog: savearborheights.com
  
• Later on I was invited to join another , as a temporary contributor.

So where's the stuff to be thankful for? As it turns out, it came on Thanksgiving Eve. I found myself frantically driving into downtown Seattle Wednesday afternoon for a rendezvous at Seattle University, to pick up a little green and white piece of joy, donated to my classroom.

It is good to think about this sweet little machine again, after the rough ride weekend. It hasn't had much attention the past few days. Wait 'til the kids meet it.

XO users know you have to name your machines. I named the fifth XO in my third grade classroom...

Arbor Heights

technorati tag: savearborheights

S.O.S.

Save our School

When your school program is dispersed, destroyed, and eliminated - to be replaced in the very same building by a new population, it is tough, to say the least.

One must assume the new population is more worthy of the space than your original program and current students and families. It is important to note here the distinction between building, program, and population.

Think Value.

Check the links above. If this does not make sense to you, or if you wish to speak up for my school, Arbor Heights Elementary (what it brings to our city and world), please let me know, by leaving a comment here, or sending me an email.

technorati tag: savearborheights

This and That

As I get my thoughts together, I'm reminded of the practice I used to use here, of highlighting blog posts I'd read - that I thought others would find interesting. I know many do that sort of thing these days.

This isn't about what others might necessarily find interesting or informative. What follow are a few events that have stayed in my forward, conscious, day to day thinking over the past few days. As you will see by the list, my life is very scattered right now, so when something sticks around for a while, I figure it's time to note it.

• Julie Amero - state of CT finally dropped felony charges (4 years later!)
  
• College football - the U. of Wash, one of my alma maters, is one of the worst in the country
  
• Graham Wegner's post - on the Edublog nominations, I will go back here for more (Dan Meyer's stuff - wow)
  
• Classblogmeister ning - decision to go private vs. public (= loss of rss - ouch!)
  
• Lynn's battle w/leukemia - a colleague at my school - am trying to help a little, w/tech
  
• OLPC G1G1 - a big buzz around the XO, as it is now available again
• Solar Panel frustrations with my XO's - forum discussions here, here, and here
  
• Report cards - in the midst of parent conferences, my third graders blogged about fear, rewards, and why...

XO Rising

It is back, the XO laptop, available to the general public (except Canada - aaack). Great reviews are already in, especially for the partnership with Amazon.com.

It is the same machine offered last year, with a little spiffier set of applications, at the same price. What I see a little different is the straight out appeal to just donate. If you want to just give one, you can now.

A couple of videos capture it all. I'll skip the Tom Brady endorsements, at least directly.... First up is the wonderful Zimi's Story, from OLPC:


Then there's Nicholas Negroponte himself, the man with the vision, speaking with Charlie Rose:


For those thinking about getting one for themselves, or for their kids, here is the email I just sent to the parents in my third grade classroom, as posted in an XO discussion forum:

Because of all the hype, I always start with a note of caution. I've heard from many who have been disappointed in what they bought (but that's why we''ve had 3 donated to our classroom!) Anyway, here's what I emailed to the parents in my third grade classroom last week, because my kids are really talking about XO's, Christmas, Amazon, etc:

As you probably know by now, we have 4 XO laptops in our classroom. Kids often ask where they can get one, and now there is more talk because they will be available in a week, at amazon.com. They'll probably be available to the public for a month or so, same as last year: http://amazon.com/xo (G1G1 - Give one, Get one) The main site for the One Laptop Per Child organization is http://laptop.org

If you would like to see one in action, please stop by our classroom and take a look (maybe parent conference time?). The cost will be $400, I think. The XO should not at all be seen as a replacement for a regular laptop. While they can do many amazing things, they use a different operating system (Sugar, based on Linux), are pretty slow, and have limitations on things we take for granted (like printing, or tech support, for example). That said, they are still pretty incredible - they can go on the internet, can be used as an ebook reader, have SD and USB slots, etc, etc.

They were designed to be used in groups, especially in underdeveloped countries. They were priced and built the way they are so governments could purchase and distribute tens of thousands of them at a time. Are they still a great learning tool for kids anywhere? Absolutely.

I just thought I'd drop you a note on this, as I hear kids talking, and Christmas is around the corner Smiley Let me know if you have any questions. - Mark

Here's a link to all the writings I posted here last school year about our experiences with the XO.

Finally, here's a quickie Animoto show from last year:


technorati tags: xo olpc negroponte roomtwelve

Classroom reaction to the election

The day after the presidential election in my third grade classroom was incredible - jubilant, highly charged, reflective, and so very personal. We started the day as always, writing. I asked the kids to write down what they thought about the election results and what it was like at home last night. It was so quiet you could have heard a pin drop. I had to give them more time. They demanded it.

Later they blogged about the election. They colored red and blue states on a large electoral college map that ended up in front of the school. And they had to talk about election night:

• They all watched the results on TV.
• Most watched McCain's speech. Some felt bad for him.
  
• Almost all stayed up to watch Obama's speech, some said more than once. Several said they recorded it.
  
• Several wrote and - talked - about their parents crying - tears of joy. If they had not caught on that this election was a very big deal until then, this certainly drove it home.
  

Several teachers talked about tears today as well. There were hugs, high fives, and lots of smiles in the hallways.

My kids have been asking me who I was going to vote for, and I've not told them - but my bike (parked in the staff room) has carried a little political message the past few days. Today I told them.

I cannot remember a happier time.

Quiet Heroes

In North Carolina on the eve of the election, Barack Obama speaks about the death of his grandmother:



Thanks to Tim Lauer, via Twitter