Being a certified technology (the subject) teacher, I replied to both Tom and the person who re-tweeted his statement.  I couldn’t find a screenshot of my exact statement, but I know it was something like “Ed tech isn’t a subject, but technology (former industrial arts) is.  Let’s not confuse them.”

Certainly I could’ve been more eloquent in 140 characters… perhaps sending a follow-up tweet explaining why the different uses of the term were personal to me.  It didn’t hit me until afterwards that some people might live in states/countries/provinces where there isn’t a mandatory “technology” class in their school.  This post was meant to educate people about the different uses of the term so that you understand where I’m coming from.

Confusion: Technology Education

No longer called “shop” or “industrial arts”, New York State (and many others) revised their standards and renamed the program to “Technology” in the mid-1980s. Wood shop, metal shop, plastics, transportation, electronics, drafting, principles of engineering, problem solving, and even some farming courses in the rural districts fell beneath this umbrella.  One year of technology is required in New York State by the time a student finishes the 8th grade.  Most schools offer the course .5 year in 7th and .5 year in 8th grade, most often splitting the year with either Art or Family & Consumer Science (formerly known as home economics).

In a technology education course there aren’t any rules forcing the use of instructional technologies at all.  I could teach (and did, years ago) a complete semester of technology never as much as touching a computer.  Technology (in New York) is based on seven key ideas:

• Engineering Design
• Management of Technology
• Impacts of Technology
• History of Technology
• Tools, Resources, and Processes of Technology
• Computer Technology
• Technological Systems

The term “technology” in this sense is defined as “anything human-made that extends our ability to do something.”  Hammers are technology, as are computers, ipods, doorbells, cow bells, underwear, and dynamite.  Technology is very much a course here in NY, and it has little to do with what we think of as technology in everyday vernacular.

To make things a bit fuzzier, NY doesn’t currently have any standards for Ed Tech.  Unlike most other states who have adopted the ISTE NETS standards, the only time many of us in NY hear the word “technology” is when referring to the course.  My district has adopted the NETS standards, but I’m going to guess fewer than five percent of the staff are even aware of this.  It isn’t state-tested, our teaching certificates don’t depend on it, it isn’t part of the observation process… and the implementation of educational technologies in the classroom doesn’t seem to be a priority for most administrators.   I’d love to discuss the ed tech support system in place but it’s pretty complex.  Suffice it to say many districts don’t have a single instructional technologist on staff and they contract all of their PD out to regional BOCES systems – which is good in some ways, but really limits teachers to the amount of support they have when they’re in the middle of class and something technical “just isn’t working”.

Local source of confusion: International Baccalaureate (IB) Technology

Our district is an IB district.  Not just one building or two, but all of our middle school students are part of the program and any high school student who wishes to pursue their diploma is free to do so regardless of the building they are in. I’m not going to talk much about IB itself here – there are plenty of resources online – but I did want to point out how they refer to technology.  IB Technology includes any subject or lesson based around their 5-step design cycle (Investigate, Plan, Design, Create, Evaluate).  In my district this includes business courses, technology courses, f/c sciences, and middle school health.  Even though the state of NY tenures us in our individual areas, IB puts us all under the same umbrella.  This just adds one more level of confusion to the word – especially since all of these classes are referred to as “technology” when we’re discussing schedules with our students.

Global source of confusion: Instructional / Educational Technology

This, of course, needs no explanation.  Generally referring to modern computer/media-based educational tools, this is what most of the people who read this post will think of when they think of technology.  In some districts and states there are people referred to as “technology integrators” – they aren’t going to show you how to use a bandsaw as part of your unit on 18th century capitalism, but they are going to help with setting up a blog or showing how Twitter can be an amazing source of information.

Another source of confusion: Information Technology (IT)

I can’t tell you how many times a friend or colleague has called me excitedly about a job opening they found.  ”Corning Incorporated is looking for a few IT people!  You should apply!”  Since I loved computer programming and networking, I’d actually be able to pull off one of these jobs if I had to.  However, IT is much more of a technical subject than Ed Tech, IB Tech, or Tech Ed.  <–and yes, I just differentiated between strands of technology by using the term “technical”.

IT is based more in the innerworkings of communication devices and systems.  An IT person can probably program a router, diagnose dropped packets on a VoIP network, or set up a DMZ area to keep hackers out of your important data.  They are the ones who deal with security, connectivity, and usability for the end-users.

Conclusion

I’m an IB technology teacher of technology education who  has a degree in (and an affinity for) educational technology and who has a bit of experience in the information technology world.  Does that win me an iPad?

One thing I love even more: getting something to the point of “near perfection.”

Because once I get something as close to perfect as possible I allow myself to move on to the next project. And as someone who loves projects, there’s nothing more satisfying than tackling something fresh and new without worrying about splitting time between multiple jobs.

As a project hoarder (I truly am…) I have enough stuff lined up in my head to keep me busy well past my death. But I’d be unhappy if I didn’t.
—-

So here’s the problem: I’m looking for a job as a Director of Technology (preferably in a school district). I’ve interviewed multiple times in the last few years and have actually made it to the final round three different times. Out of those three times, more than once I’ve called the potential employer up and requested that my name be removed from consideration after being given a tour of the facilities. See, here in upstate NY almost every school district has had extensive infrastructure and technology upgrades in the last few years. You walk into pristine server rooms, every piece of cable is labeled, there’s a wireless infrastructure able to handle 1:1 programs, etc.

It’s all too perfect.

I want to make a difference. That’s what drove me into education in the first place, and that’s why I think I went into technology. I went to a fairly prestigious technical & engineering university as a freshman and was literally the first guy anyone called when they had computer problems. I never advertised or asked for money… just loved being the guy who would walk across campus with poledit.exe (one of my many tricks) on a floppy disk and would walk out of the person’s room with a handshake and sometimes a cold beverage (preferably a Coke Classic). I probably could’ve made some serious cash that year, but never felt compelled to charge. I decided that I enjoyed showing people how to fix things just as much as I liked fixing them myself, so I went into Technology Education (and later Educational Technology).

Now I’m not sure what to do about this. I continue to volunteer at local businesses, doing all sorts of cabling and server work and setting up off-site backups amongst other things; some the small bits and pieces that I love tinkering with. But I really want to be able to lead a school district somewhere. I don’t want to walk in and have my largest issue be changing the bulbs in a projector or deploying the newest version of Paint.net to the school. I want a job that doubles as a long-term project… not one that’s simply maintaining the status quo. In the meantime I tell people I’m waiting for the “perfect job” to come along – which hopefully includes a lot of imperfection.

Anybody else out there have this “problem”? Is this normal? Do schools that look perfect have hidden flaws buried within?

I’m a systems thinker. I detail in my Bio the fact that I am passionate about the entire educational system, from the taxpayers to the students to the cafeteria workers to the plumbers. Many people are quick to place the blame of so-called “failing schools” on poor teachers, unfunded mandates, overpaid administrators, inadequate facilities, greedy teachers’ unions, community strife, MTV, and so on. From my point of view, however, anyone who blames the shortfalls of public education on just one or two factors is oversimplifying a very complex systemic breakdown.

The opposite is also true. Anybody who thinks real, meaningful change can occur system-wide by changing one piece of the puzzle is probably in for a rude awakening. For real, meaningful, lasting reform to take place in our educational system the stars have to align and multiple changes need to occur simultaneously. Any of these things by themselves will support a certain level of reform; the more that occur, the more effective the reform will be.

What I’m going to suggest today – my “recipe 4 reform” – will detail a few of the changes that I believe need to be made for effective pedagogical reform to occur.

We’ll begin by emptying the entire bag of traditional learning into a large mixing bowl. There’s nothing quite like the smell of century-old traditions and systems flowing out of its container and into the 21st century. Its probably a good idea to mix it up a little bit now, as there’s a significant chance it’ll be coming out lumped into strands once thought to make sense. Once its all in the bowl you’re ready for the next step.

Unfortunately our recipe doesn’t call for some of the stuff that has already been emptied into the bowl. Any small pieces of bananas sages on the stages that you may find, please throw in the trash. Likewise, if you’re able to find any traces of boring professional development, flash-in-the-pan initiatives, or unmeaningful grading schemes please be sure to remove them and discard them. What we should be left with is a fine, powdery mix of everything that was good a century ago.

Next, add to the bowl a container of web tools (in some markets this is sold as “web 2.0″). These come in many flavors – finding the right mixture is always the chef’s preference. Along those same lines we’re going to add a good amount of online social professional development (the type that’s flexible and comes in a variety of shapes and sizes). Grab your blender and mix that soupy mess all together, being sure to leave nothing untouched.

Let everything sit for a while; perhaps long enough for the teachers to embrace what has changed but not so long that the test scores drop. That would require a re-write of the recipe, which, like everything else, is nearly impossible to do with the current lame-duck congress.

Once this mixture starts to gel, it’ll want a box to constrain itself to. The most fun part of the solidification process, however, is what we don’t do. We aren’t going to actually put this slop into a mold. We’re going to put it in a plastic bag and allow all of the users to squeeze it into their own mold. It’s always more fun to see what others can do with something than it is to force them to do something in a specific manner.

Since the outcome is unique for everyone – students, teachers, administrators, etc – make sure to document the process and the product. Since the final test in this recipe lies in that documentation, make sure to share it digitally so that others can review it and make comments. This portfolio should follow the user from A-Z, K-12, or from newbie through competent so that at the end of the day everyone can prove what they’ve done and where they’ve been.

I know it’s contrived… and I had to eliminate a handful of ingredients in order to make it fit in the “blog” category and not in the “longer-than-the-dictionary” one. My point? Mix it up! Let’s make the changes that *everyone* agrees have to be made but everyone is too scared to implement.

Think much?

For some towns or cities, one potential answer to this problem is to put a lot of money into their educational system. The thinking is that if the schools are as good as they can be people will want to live in the area, businesses will come, and alumni will have better memories – possibly attracting them (or their money) back.

But the first step is always acknowledging problem, right?

My school district has failed to pass a major building project ever since I can remember – we’re the only school district in the county (or region, actually) in that situation. The administration spent many years and tens of thousands of dollars working with a non-partisan committee to come up with a “master plan” for the district – an idea that wouldn’t have added any money to the current tax rate and would’ve given the students completely renovated schools throughout the district. As it was put up for a vote in the community the things that we heard all the time were “the schools were fine when I was there” or “teachers need to stop whining and deal with what they’ve got”. The result of the vote was good – for the naysayers. And the Board of Education had to go back to the drawing board and try to figure out what to do with our aging and crumbling buildings.

And then it hit me: the problem is that we’re doing too good of a job for the community.

If we had a dropout rate of 20%, we were on the Schools in Need of Improvement (SINI) list, or we had trouble attracting good teachers to our district I think the community would’ve voted almost unanimously for the project. But we’re resourceful. We’ve managed to take some of the worst facilities in the state and still cultivate students who are ready for college and/or the workforce as good as (or better than) neighboring districts.

It seems that we the school district is at fault. Many people haven’t seen the needs for change here; they haven’t yet acknowledged the problem. The overall community is too proud for that.

But a few miles down the road is another school district – my alma mater, in fact. They’ve had more building projects in the last decade than my current district has had in the last forty years. Their community doesn’t argue about their facilities – when they are asked to vote for education, they do. And for good reason: they want their kids to be successful enough to get out of town. That’s right – they value their schools so much not because they want their kids to come back home after college but because they want them to be able to leave.

I'm outta here!

So are good facilities mandatory for a quality education? Is it wrong for a community to support their schools just to encourage the kids to pack up and go? If we offer a quality education to all students – regardless of the economy of the community – does anything else really matter? Do the goals of retaining or retreating make a difference when it comes to supporting the schools?

The Technology Education department at the SUNY at Oswego never let us mistake the fact that we weren’t “education majors”, but instead were “technology majors”. I happened to be the president of the Oswego Technology Education Association (OTEA) during my senior year and one of the ideas that I pushed was to associate ourselves with the Education Club at the college. I couldn’t understand why we were all students in the school of education, yet our organizations barely knew each other existed. I officially joined the Ed Club and went to a few of their meetings myself, but during my tenure was never able to bring the organizations any closer together. While most of my technology classmates were working on their trucks, their houses, and their wood projects the Ed Club was inviting speakers to the school to discuss everything from learning styles to special education terminologies.

There were a lot of things that I never learned about education while in that program. Thankfully New York requires all teachers to obtain a masters degree before becoming permanently certified. Without that necessity there is no doubt I’d be an old-school shop teacher with little to no understanding of the education system (or the students) that surrounded me.

[note: from what I was told the Oswego Technology Education program has changed substantially in the last decade. I am speaking about the program before most of the current staff was hired.]

Although I was offered an assistantship to stay in Oswego for my masters, I elected instead to get something different. With a heavy background in computers and networking I decided that an Instructional Technology degree would fit me perfectly. So I enrolled in the program at SUNY Potsdam.

I was to be known as an “instructional technologist” once admitted into that program. We had thrown around the term of “Educational Technologist”, but the latest AECT definition for the field suggested that it was incorrect – so we made darn sure we used the “correct” terms when talking about our major.

The terms may seem interchangeable from most people’s points of view. Teachers deliver instruction/lead education, so the terms must mean the same thing. BUT – as I’ve been re-thinking my philosophy on education I’m realizing that teachers don’t need to be the “sage on the stage”. They can facilitate. They can lead the students to learning, but they can’t make them think. I like to think that my background and knowledge encompass more than just “instructional” uses of technology; I use technology to instruct but also to learn, guide, suggest, develop, and evaluate (amongst other things). Because of the breadth of the field I now consider myself an educational technologist… although since NY doesn’t have a certification for that I am (and always will be) officially an instructional technologist.

image courtesy of http://www.vecteezy.com

After spending all of my savings on these degrees you’re probably wondering why I’m still teaching technology (shop) to middle school kids. And you know what – sometimes I wonder the same thing.

My work background is that of a technology teacher. I’ve applied for administrative jobs and have been told that my background doesn’t lend itself to education in general – that it’s too specific. I’ve been told that I’ll never get an administrative job in my current district because “administrators are a dime a dozen; technology teachers are a needle in a haystack“. And now… with budgets the way they are… many districts in the upstate NY area are re-naming their technology coordinators as “technology specialists” and hiring civil service people for them. I spent 7 years in school, a boatload of money, and have worked my butt off for the past decade when all I needed to do was take a civil service test??? Really???

Do you have any labels that either hinder you, help you, or impact you in any real way? Do your labels reflect who you are, or do you reflect what your labels want you to be?

So I decided to run with it. I tried to explain the situation to every one of my classes. We watched “Did You Know”, we discussed how other countries have caught us and passed us, and we had amazing dialog about what could happen if we continue on our current path. Of course all of the students had ideas about changing the school so that we didn’t need to add time, but I wanted to put them in the box and see what they could do. As a class we came up with three possible frameworks for adding time to the schedule (although I realize there are many other options):

1. Simply adding 20 days into the school year. I proposed that maybe we could still have a long summer vacation by having classes every-other Saturday, but that wasn’t considered very practical. Of the four ideas, this one was my personal least favorite – but this wasn’t about me, it was about my students.
2. Adding a few hours to the school day, restructuring time, and still having the same summer vacation. The older students who are able to play sports didn’t like this idea very much. Most couldn’t imagine having sports practice until 7 or 8PM (our modified teams are usually done by 5:30.) Many students, however, really liked this idea due to the fact that their summers wouldn’t be impacted.

   Restructuring time was an important part of this idea, too. We figured that 2 hours a day Monday-Thursday would be an entire fifth day of school per week – so we could cut classes back to a 4-day schedule. The fifth day would be used for clubs, organizations, academic support, field trips, educational field experiences, etc.

3. Integrating more non-traditional learning opportunity into the schedule. We thought about online courses mostly, but a few of the boys in the class wanted nothing to do with it. They wanted to rebuild trucks and engines – you know, manly stuff (their words). So voila! Use authentic experiences as science labs / technology projects / etc. Allow the students to write these things up for school credit. It sounds like a crazy idea to some, but this one was my absolute favorite.

After having this discussion amongst my students – all of whom are in sixth, seventh, or eighth grade – we took a survey. I asked everyone to vote as if one of them was really going to happen in our building. The results actually surprised me greatly.

Out of the 75 students polled, only 9 wanted to simply add 20 days to the calendar. Whew! Glad I wasn’t alone!

48 students – almost 65% – chose to go to a 4-day academic week and use the fifth day as a support day. Surprisingly most of the athletes who had originally scoffed at the idea came aboard after talking to their friends about the options.

That leaves 18 who would’ve voted with me on the non-traditional opportunities. To be honest I think my passion for that option may have lured a few of the voters in, as it seemed the students who sit closest to me were primarily the ones voting with me. (But I didn’t vote and tried to remain impartial.)

Granted, I was having these discussions with younger students who really weren’t grounded in the harsh realities of high school schedules, boyfriends/girlfriends, SATs, etc. None as much as mentioned teachers or parents throughout the entire process – obviously major stakeholders in this equation. And there were a good number of students who didn’t want to discuss this topic at all, as they “weren’t going to do nothin’ during their time off”. But I think it showed a lot of creativity to come up with these ideas, a lot of good discourse to talk about the pros and cons of each one, and a lot of deep thinking by the students to vote on something that nobody really wants.

Has a discussion like this happened recently in your school? Any ideas to add?

Right here, right now, there is no other place I want to be
Right here, right now, watching the world wake up from history

I sat in my eighth grade History class listening to Jesus Jones’ “Right Here, Right Now” blasting out of the teacher’s boombox. It was 1991 and the topic de jour was centered around how much the world had changed in the past 50 years. Pretty much everything has been invented already, I remember thinking as I sat there and listened to him drone on and on about “when he was a kid…” We were at the end of the age of newness, and I’d live the rest of my life with everything that we had right then.

I wonder if kids still think that? Sometimes I wonder if adults do?

So as I was teaching my eighth-grade class a little History of Technology last week, I cranked up the speakers and played them the same song. Other than enduring some harassment for choosing an “old” song, I think I was able to successfully facilitate the same discussion that I’d been a part of two decades earlier. Surprisingly, however, the students were probably more interested in the topic than I was – which completely caught me off guard. Most of the conversation that followed, however, was based around something that happened by coincidence while we were talking…

My TweetDeck popped up an #EdChat notification on my projection screen.

“What’s that”, one student asked. “It’s his Twitter account and he shouldn’t be using it in school”, replied another. The the barrage of comments started flowing; “I don’t use Twitter – it’s stupid. I use Yahoo! Messenger and send text messages”; “I use AIM”; “I use Facebook” “Facebook is stupid”; “All of my friends use MSN”; “MySpace is so much better than everything else”… I live for teachable moments, so this was almost too good to be true.

I could discuss every detail of the rest of that class, but it’s the epiphany I had afterward that I want to discuss here. Why, with all of the highly-developed communication programs that are (and have been) available, has Twitter taken off? Why does it seem like it’s the impetus for an educational revolution that’s gaining momentum every day? Why didn’t educators flock to an AOL Chatroom when it first came out? What was wrong with Yahoo! Chatrooms? MS NetMeeting? ICQ Chat? Orkut? Yuku? Freetel? (and the list goes on and on…) So why Twitter? Why here, why now?

In all honesty I haven’t got an answer to that question. I’m hoping some of you will be able to comment and help me out! Is this educational revolution relatively new? Has it been going on in certain private circles for decades? Am I part of something big, or is this all going to be a passing “fad” by mainstream educators? Will the education books look back at 2008-2009 and say “this is where the tide turned” – or will we simply be a blip on one of the waves? (no pun intended – although it was pretty good, eh?)

Why here, why now? Why Twitter, why #edchat? Why me and you?

#edchat is an event that happens twice every Tuesday – 12:00PM and 7:00PM Eastern Time. Topics for the chat are submitted and voted on by anybody, whether they are wallflowers or verbose speed-tweeters. Tonight’s topic happens to be Does Homework Improve Learning?. Anybody on Twitter can join the conversation by simply searching for #edchat (so you can see what’s being said) and include the hastag #edchat in your tweets. Your messages will show up with all of the others. Yes, it’s really that easy. The most amazing aspect of #edchat is the wide variety of people, experiences, and opinions you get in a very short amount of time. Often these conversations will last for 2-3 days afterwards in the forms of replies and/or direct messages.

Back on topic now… One of the thoughts that was brought up over and over again last week during the 7PM (EDT) #edchat was essentially “we’re preaching to the choir – how do we get others (classroom teachers who aren’t already knee-deep in technology implementation) into the discussion?” And I figured out today how I’m going to do it.

I teach in a middle school technology classroom with a lab area and 19 computers. I’ve got a mounted projector and a big white screen (nothing interactive yet – my Wiimote project never worked as planned.) What I plan to try this year is to open my lab up for district teachers on Tuesday nights. I’d leave at 3:30, grab some dinner and run errands, whatever – and head back to the building by 5:00. Open the lab up from 5:00-9:00 for any teacher in the district who might need help or wants to talk technology. At 6:30, however, the lights would dim, the projector would come on, and I’d give a demo about #edchat and how Twitter can be used for uPD. By 7:00 we’d be able to have user accounts set up for any newbies (unlike @oswego98) and anyone in the room could participate in the chat. Standing in front of a large group of people and trying to explain what to do with Twitter can be challenging – but giving them a real demo that is relevant to their career and interests and then allowing them full control to participate themselves… sounds like a plan!

I’m actually thinking that I might get 4-5 teachers from my own building the first week… wishful thinking, maybe? But if the following week I could double that (by offering it to anyone in the district) I’d have a significant number of people in my district exposed to both Twitter and #edchat. How many will use it on a weekly basis? I don’t know – maybe 3 or 4? Hopefully more? But it would be amazing to see and hear people’s reactions when they finally realize what Twitter can do. I certainly wish I would’ve had a “Twitter-tutor” when I began. It will also give me a dedicated night to organize my lab, try any software/hardware experiments, discuss technology with other teachers, and write blog posts or work on other online projects.

Has anyone else ever experimented with opening up labs after school for other teachers? Or offering “free, unofficial professional development” for fun? My hopes are that I’ll meet some other people like myself, have some fun, and learn a ton. What does everyone think? Will I need to order pizzas and wings to get people there?

For more information on #edchat, check out Mary Beth’s blog post. I hope to speak to all of you on Tuesday!