Engaging Parents through Home School Partnerships

Engaging with parents in an authentic partnership to educate students is way more complex in this decade because we are using learning tools that didn't exist when most of our parents and teachers went to school. So we have less of a shared understanding of what education looks like and feels like.

I have just re-read Dr Mona Mourshed's quote from The Education Project conference I attended last year,

"Students spend 60% of their time out of school. Technology has the power to unleash the potential of the student because they have access to learning during the 60% time."

and been reminded again how important it is that we move forward WITH our parent community if we want the Manaiakalani project to be effective in our 4 major goals:

1. To raise student achievement outcomes
2. To make learning portable (Anywhere, Anytime, Anyplace =A3)
3. To have engaged learners
4. To ensure our students have employment readiness

In the early stages of this project our 4 development strands are occurring almost behind the scenes:

• Mindware development
• Infrastructure
• Devices
• Cloud solutions

But it is essential that we keep our stakeholder groups (students, teachers, parents, government officials, business partners etc) informed and included so that when the day comes to "Go Live" we are all moving in the same direction!

It has been a particular pleasure this year to participate in Home School Partnerships being held in our community of schools in the evening. I have attended and participated in the ones focussed on the Manaiakalani project and each has been a positive and successful event. We have learnt things along the way, so here goes:

The Purpose needs to be very clear, particularly within the staff and school leadership.
Trying to cram in too many key messages about a variety of events dilutes each message.
For these eveings the purpose has been; to inform the parents about the Manaiakalani project and how it is progressing in their school, and to give the parents a hands-on opportunity to interact with their own children's shared learning. And even then it has been important to take small steps, so we have been focussing on getting them interacting with the student blogs so far this year.

Knowing the parent community is most important; what are their particular needs, where are they likely to be in their current understanding of the mindware and the technology behind the Manaiakalani projects, and what will induce them to come out at night!
As all our schools are decile one and are in a 3km by 2km geographical area, the parents have a lot in common. Many of them are sole caregivers, they often have larger families, many will walk to the meetings, and our recent survey showed less than 25% have the internet in their homes. They are predominantly Maori or Pasifika families.

We know that what will bring our parents out at night is their children! They are supportive of their children and their learning and love seeing what they are doing at school. So the evenings need to include the children and we get them to bring their parents along. Issues we need to have thought through are:

Child minding

• Food - kids are always happy when they have something in their tummies!
• How are we going to get the children to interact with their parents? If the evening is about getting the parents using computers then the children need to be firmly told to keep their hands off the mouse. If the parents are not confident they will sit back and let the kids do it for them - and we all know that watching some whizz kid tearing around the screen is no way to learn anything about using a computer. We heard this thinking confirmed by teachers from the Maine 1:1 project at ISTE recently.
  

Schools have used various inducements to attend including:

• kids putting on a couple of items first
• kids writing personal invitations on cards to their parents
• printing out invitations on a thin strip of paper and attaching to every child as a wrist band before they leave in the afternoon - that way most get home!

The formalities for the evening which seem to make an impact are:

• having the principal welcome the parents and give the project a huge public seal of approval
• having a brief overview in plain English (all geek terms stripped out!) about what we are trying to achieve and why
• teachers standing up and speaking about how it is actually working in the classroom and impacting the kids
• explaining exactly what we would like parents to do - again in very plain English - "We want you to read your own child's work and leave them positive feedback!"

Giving the parents an opportunity to have a go themselves is very important. How this is best carried out depends on each school's facilities, but most have sent the parents off to classrooms along with the teachers and let the parents sit down at classroom computers with teachers helping them. We have found that where we had well laid out instruction sheets for the parents we have had the most success. Particularly with large visual screen shots of what to do.

There needs to be an extension group too because we have found in each school a group of parents who have access to computers and have technical skills, especially with FaceBook. Teaching them how to use RSS to feed their child's blog posts to their FB has been successful. And working parents have appreciated being able to include their email address in the blog RSS settings so they get notified (often at work!) when a new post is published.

The evenings have been greatly appreciated and will be an ongoing feature of the Manaiakalani project. Our next step will be providing workshops for parents to develop their digital literacy further. It will be great when we can have cluster workshops that parents from any of the schools can attend, at times which suits them.

The video below is from Tamaki Primary School, in Panmure. They held a movie and popcorn event at the beginning to show the parents some of the student' movies.

Netbooks - The pencil NOT the book

As we prepare for the unprecedented (in New Zealand) rollout of 1:1 computing for a community of Decile 1 students, one of our recurring discussions has been about the misunderstandings the terms 'notebook' or 'netbook' lead to.

In our planning and preparations we see the device the students use as the pencil or pen. This provides lots of flexibility in terms of what we choose or even what the students bring from home.

The "book" for the Manaiakalani schools is definitely the Cloud solution we have set up. In our case this is Google Apps for Education.

We expect our students to be writing on documents in the cloud, using spreadsheets, creating presentations and even drawing and recording sound via their "books" in the cloud. The Google Apps are supplemented by a wide variety of Web 2 tools teachers and students can select from.

When our educators get their heads around this concept, it answers the questions which arise time and again; what software will be on their devices? what happens when they break or leave them at home? how much storage space will be on their hard drives? etc?

The device is simply the pencil - if it breaks, just like a pencil, get another one (or sharpen it!) and carry on working because your "book" is in the cloud.

This simplicity in thinking and working depends of course on a very reliable supply of fast internet to every school and home. And we are working on that too.

Thanks very much Lepa from Room 18 for drawing the graphics I wanted :)

Bloom's Taxonomy

It is not unusual to hear teachers dismiss Bloom's taxonomy as ' something we had to learn at teacher's college' and follow this up with why the flavour of the month is a better metacognitive approach to learning.  I have always found Blooms to be a practical and 'easy to understand and implement' approach, and even more so since Andrew Churches has begun sharing his work around Bloom's Digital Taxonomy.  It was interesting to hear how widely accepted and respected his work has become when we were at the ISTE conference too. Having Creating at the top of the Higher Order Thinking chain certainly reflects the work being carried out in the Manaiakalani schools.

This video link tweeted by @jcorippo is not only amusing, but is a good example of Creating in action.

iPad for grown-ups: reading books

I have been reading lots of educators postings about the iPad sharing all kinds of cool ways to use them in school and for learning, but I have always known that when I finally get one it will be for me!  Because I am a reader and everyone I live with is a reader (Define: reader  = a person who reads fiction regularly during the school term as well as serious work-related material; a person who will stay up into the wee hours of the morning during a working week on occasion reading fiction until it is finished!). When we all go on holiday together too much of the car boot space is taken up with library books. So the advent of a versitile eBook reader will be a wonderful asset to our household.

For the past week I have had an iPad and today I sadly/gladly handed it over to the person I bought it for.  I would have bought two so I could have one for myself, but we searched six states in the USA as we travelled and we only ever managed to find the one wifi iPad sitting in a store waiting to be bought - at Best Buy in Medina, Ohio.

So while I had the iPad I downloaded the Apple book reader, iBooks; the Barnes and Noble book reader; Amazon's Kindle reader; Borders' book reading app; and a free one called Free Books.

Then I bought a few books, took advantage of Barnes and Nobles free eBooks and downloaded lots from Project Gutenburg.  I also added a few lengthy .pdfs that I had been meaning to read. Then I tried to squeeze in as much reading time as I could. Fortunately a flight from one coast of the US to the other, a 6 hour stop-over in LAX and a 12 hour flight to NZ gave plenty of opportunity to read a few books and documents.

Here are some of my thoughts from the past week of reading....

There really wasn't a lot to pick and choose between the reading apps.  They all had nice page turning, bookmarks, the ability to go online and lookup words or information (if you have wireless - which of course I never had on a plane).  They did the double page landscape and the single page portrait.  I was a bit miffed that it was only pdfs that you could pinch and squeeze to enlarge text.  I had anticipated being able to do that with books and give aging eyes a break.

The real differences come in what they allowed you to download or to buy. Project Gutenburg is currently providing the backbone to all of the reading apps and the free book giveaways. It has 33,000 titles available to download for free and it is surprising to discover which books are already out of copyright and have now been digitised by the team of volunteers working on this project. All the classics and childhood favourites are there. I think that the Free Book app has the best interface of the ones I tried for reading these. I notice that if you go to the iTunes Store it is a free download, but the weblink is charging $1.99.

I presume the iBook reader is not yet available in NZ because iPads are not here yet. And if it is like the music and movie iTunes store, the US offerings will be different from the NZ ones. So that works fine if you have a US account.  Barnes and Noble work from IP address and will not sell to anyone outside North America.  I really don't know what that is about.  I downloaded lots while I was there, but know that there will be nothing more from now on - unless anyone cares to email me some of the next round of free books ;)  Amazon is quite bizarrre.  While I had a US IP address, they knew I was a New Zealand customer and wanted to charge me a $2 shipping fee!!! for eBooks.  So I didn't try any of theirs. And Borders seemed to be the most straight forward.  Give them your credit card and they will sell you an eBook.  I like that non-discriminatory approach.

Most of the readers offer the option to read in sepia rather than just black on white.  That is a nice option for the eyes.  And I did like the way I was able to turn the backlight brightness down on the plane to give my eyes a rest too.  The battery lasted easily for 10 hours, but we discovered today that it is a trial when you are up to a good part in a book and the battery goes flat.  Talk about frustrating.

Reading in bed with it is fine.  Reading on the plane was not quite as good.  Planes are uncomfortable at the best of times and the iPad didn't squish into the confined space in the same way a paperback does. But reading pdfs on a plane via iPad is way better than wads of printouts.  If you are a person who falls asleep over your reading and lets a book slide to the floor with a thunk, then you would need to invest in a good protective case!

Biggest frustration; not being able to quickly flip back through the pages when you have lost a piece of plot context and you want to check up on something that happened earlier.  

In conclusion, it is probably clear from this post that I am a fan of the iPad as a book reading device for grown-ups.

Global Collaboration

One of the joys and benefits of technology developments in the past decade has been the ability to connect, communicate and collaborate with people from all over the world as part of our shared learning experiences. We have benefited from having a number of schools in the USA interested in video conferencing with our students and working together on collaborative projects. However, because we have some shared history from Europe a few hundred years back, we can be lulled into thinking that we need to be doing 'projects' together rather than spending time finding out about how each other lives and sees life.

After two weeks in the USA enjoying the unfailing hospitality and kindness of people across the six states we visited, I have been reflecting again on the many cultural differences between Kiwis and North Americans. Many times I have reminded myself to not be deceived by the fact that we speak different versions of the same language. We have very different cultures, influenced as much by factors such as geography and climate as by our forebears.

I would urge both Kiwis and Americans to make the most of these digital communication opportunities to explore (and enjoy) the real cultural differences between us and not make presumptions based on what we glimpse on television ( NB: Kiwis) or how Peter Jackson and other movie directors portray us (NB: Americans). This is the first time I have visited the USA when more than 50% of the people I have talked to have complimented me on my soccer team! And even more have told me that visiting NZ is 'On my bucket list'.

I have been taking notes as I have travelled around, mainly via photos on my phone, of things that have intrigued / amused / astounded / informed because we don't experience them in New Zealand. In no particular order, here are some snippets - Vive la difference!

items with an ** are illustrated in the photos below....

First item has to be: everything is larger than anything New Zealand has ever experienced - you name it, it will be much bigger :)

• Portions and malls; trucks and land; holiday houses - 4 bedrooms seemed minimum- and campers; fishing lines; airports

America has great roads - huge roads, fast roads, well maintained roads. Lots of toll roads to pay as you travel on. And they drive fast on them.

• Everything on the the roads seems to be huge. The trucks, the cars, the SUVs, the boats being towed.
• People tow amazing combinations - fast eg a ute towing a very large camping trailer towing a car towing a boat. All in one long line. Going fast.
• Motor cycles don't seem to require helmets - even on the freeways going fast **
• Radio station frequencies are advertised on the sides of freeways dedicated to giving you information about the area you are traveling through
• Sign on the back of a passing truck: "My USA - no comfort or aid to the enemy".
• Every state has different laws about seat belts. They change as you cross state borders eg Virginia says " Buckle up Virginia - It;'s a law we can LIVE with!"
• In some states the speed limit is enforced by aircraft!
• On a very fast freeway we all screeched to standstill while a state trooper shooed a family of ducks across the highway
• We saw 3-4 dead bambis on the side of busy roads. Maybe cars are more lethal than guns nowdays

National pride - you have to experience July 4th in the USA to really get a picture of people who know how to do national pride.

• Every house on the street flying the flag and sporting bunting. And if you go to church over the weekend you get to see it in the church context too. **
• The food in the supermarket came flag-themed with masses of red/white/blue food for sale on July 4th **
• Interesting the way they sing "God Save the Queen" on July 4th - kinda nice

Other stuff

• Inside a decadent ice-cream eatery, Cold Sone Creamery, there is a sign on the counter outlining all the ailments that these icecreams will NOT cure! We thought we were just out to get an ice-cream, not to cure cancer! **
• People kept telling us that Virginia Beach was 'very strict'. We discovered that you get fined for swearing in public, for appearing drunk while walking etc there **
• The visual pollution: power lines and billboards cluttering the sky in remote parts with beautiful scenery
• We were quite surprised that we could not eat outside when we were having meals in beachside cafes in North Carolina. The waitresses said it was against the law.
• A long public pier put over the sea was gated off and payment of $10 was required to fish and $1 to walk out onto it. **
• The air conditioning units - you need a jersey to wear inside on very hot days or you freeze
• Pennsylvania billboard: "We treasure our country, our cows, our children" - we passed it too fast to get a photo :) However, in all the miles of farmland we never saw a single cow outside on the farms. Maybe the cows were all inside somewhere….
• Bathrooms have long been a fascination of mine and this trip I saw an effective method of controlling graffiti; they placed a board inside a picture frame on the back of the toilet door - and it worked - all the messages were contained within it. But the dreaded gaps are still there! **
• Cheese - well, there is nothing that resembles the cheese we eat in NZ
• Coffee - Funny how something that you would think would be the same the world over can be so different!
• Tipping everyone, everywhere; the price appears to have gone up and they have started publishing notices to 'foreigners' that we HAVE to tip 18% of a meal bill **
• Visitors are no longer called 'aliens' - now we seem to be 'foreigners'
• Cafe menu have appetisers, salads etc but the entres section turns out to be the main course?? Asked waiters about it but they didn't understand the question (or the accent!)
  

There is lots more, but I think that we need to take time with our students to help them connect with each other and try to put themselves in each others' shoes. I believe it is easier to have a quality learning experience with kids from countries who speak a different language because we don't make presumptions that they are the same as us - just with a different accent.