Why would you want to do a collaborative project online?

Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir #3 'Water Night' received 3746 videos by 2,945 people in 73 countries. YouTube video 2 April 2012,

and received 100,000 views in the first week.

Eric Whitaker’s Virtual Choir on YouTube

Can online participation lead to something good happening in real life?

In just over 24 hours after posting one man's heartbreakingly heroic story on Reddit, more than $80,000 in donations had been pledged to a Kenyan orphanage where he saved a group of kids. The donations came from all 50 U.S. states and 46 different countries

The world in which we live is complex and interconnected. Today's students need new skills to be successful - creativity, collaboration, communication.

A digital display of the Facebook user community and the connections between users.

Where are the connections in this classroom?

How different is it from a classroom from the 1950s?

Source: Heywood Grammar School

Are we afraid to step out?

How teens view their digital lives

Entire infographic here

As teachers we need to get over that barrier first. Upskill.

Photo by Tralamander on Flickr

It's never too late

Our rationale:

Learning in a social media environment. Using skills to develop important

literacies

Why are social media literacies important?

If you know how to swim that will serve you very

well, but if you are the only person in the world who knows how to read and write then it won't serve you very well. (Howard Rheingold)

Social media literacies involve not only the skills of encoding and decoding in these media but the social part, the ability to use these skills and these media in concert with others to get things done. (Howard Rheingold)

Participatory culture: don't just consume - create (Rheingold)

Case in point: our students start blogging

Year 9s find an authentic audience - a

real story

How it started

Tania > Nick

Have I ever sent you my documentation of a collaborative project I did with a year 10 English class and students from Florida (USA) and Finland?

Nick > Tania

What a fabulous idea

A little later...

Hi Tania,

I’d like to get my yr nines to think more about what and how they are learning. I want them to be more reflective and more critical thinkers.

Can you think of the best way to make this happen?

Tania: I think I can

Tania > Nick What do you think about embedding a clustrmap

into your blog and those of your students?

Students are thrilled to see that people are reading their blog.

Nick > Tania

It's very exciting for me to see where all of this goes. I'm ok with it going nowhere/ failing, but I think it will be fun.

Nick > Tania

It's a bit scary making their work so public, but I think it will inspire them to do their best.

global audience

How is blogging different from all the other writing students do?

sharing: now I can read what you're writing

Joel Robinson's photo

authentic audience: not just writing for my teacher

Photo found on Pinterest

peer readership: writing for my friends to read (just like Facebook)

Flickr photo by h.koppdelaney

ownership of blog space: make it the way I like

empowerment: I am an author/publisher

engagement: peer encouragement

real world influence: the world is my classroom

Photo by Joel Robinson

Preparation: How to behave online

Rules: traditional

Rules: what's most important

First post:

Setting the stage

Open minds welcome

The why

Know yourself

Students buy in

Good day, Mr Fairlie Here's my Posterous Space page. http://simontr.posterous.com/

I am looking forward to post more and share my ideas.

Simon Trinh of 9L.

Nick > George

Well done, George. I love your first post. Your musing about the innate self versus the learned self is very interesting. I look forward to reading more.

Keep it up.

Mr Fairlie

First comment from 'the outside'

Nick, Penny Bentley (maths teacher and ICT mentor - Australia) commented on Simon's post.

Later she wrote on FB ' 'They are amazing, articulate young people... it's a credit to their teachers.'

Nick > Tania

Yay! Hooray! I am thrilled, and I hope Simon is too.

Nick > Tania So I just looked at our clustrmap, and saw views

from Belgrade, Luxemburg, NZ… amazing

Tania > Nick

Congratulations! You've passed 1,000 blog views!

Bringing in real people, experts

Isobelle > Tania

Thanks for asking me Tania. I will happily write a message.

Nick > Tania

Wow. This is really starting to blow my mind. A-Ma-Zing.

Isobelle Carmody writes to our students

Isobelle Carmody - Blogging... ...seems to me like a diary and yet it does have an

audience and feeling that, it causes me to treat the material I want to talk about differently...it does exactly what Mr Fairlie talks about in your site - it allows me to try out ideas on paper (well, cyberpaper) for an audience that may or may not read me, but they might, and so I have to take their presence seriously.

It allows me to find out what I think about things- that in fact is what I think all writing should be about.

Nick > Tania

Fabulous. What she wrote was just perfect. And it's addressed to the boys!

Hang on...

... is this who I think it is?

Yes, I can talk to my favourite author!

Isobelle encourages ongoing connections

Why not 2 authors?

Tania > Nick

Michael Gerard Bauer (The Running Man, Ishmael series) has agreed to write something for yr 9s on the blog.

Nick > Tania

How fantastic.

Michael gives the boys some advice

Nick > students: What's your take on Michael's post?

Students reflect on the power of words It is not so much that we take words for granted but more that we

ignore the beauty and power (and danger) they contain. Words can also be manipulative and vitriolic, possible made to

influence your thoughts in invisible ways, fooling you with their eloquence. Words can also be empty, soulless and flung with little care onto paper.

These tiny insignificant characters that are so puny and insignificant by themselves but if carefully crafted and ordered can rock an entire nation to its core.

Most people don't think about how important it is and how our lives would be completely different. We could not communicate ideas, feelings and just general informatiom. We would be locked in our own thougts, but then again, how could humans even think advanced and complex thoughts without language? We would only be able to think graphical thoughts like an image of a place.

Nick > Tania

These responses are blowing my mind. Perhaps the most exciting thing I've done in 10 years of teaching!

Teaching online conversation

Source: Daniela Volpari

Nick > Tania

They are at pains to respect each other and the ideas. They are getting it!

Now they just need to learn the opposite: that you can't afford to be overly precious about ideas. If the ideas are robust enough they will withstand some verbal punishment.

The art of commenting

Social media literacies

Conversation

The task surprises

Nick > Tania

It's becoming clear that this is as much a writing as thinking task. It sounds weird, but I saw this as a forum for developing their meta-cognition, and didn't anticipate the benefits to their writing

Voice

Source: http://www.isawthisimage.com/2011/04/50-beautiful-images-of-inspiration-time-stands-still-ar/

Nick > Tania

They are all really experimenting with voices. I love the difference in voice between the first and subsequent posts. They very often go over the top, and mimic what they think is an adult voice. This is sooo much better than what they usually produce, which is the voice they think is the 'right' one (bland and devoid of personality).

Tania > Nick

Yes, all that will hopefully happen over time. I keep forgetting they're yr 9s.

Nick > Tania

I've just read x's posts. His blog epitomizes the purpose of the project: it's deeply reflective and he's really taken chance to develop an authentic voice.

Student blog posts can surprise you

This is EXACTLY why we're doing this project. Tasks narrowly defined by me produce narrow thinking, aimed at pleasing me (!)

How would you devise an assessment task aimed at eliciting this kind of work?

"Write a reflective essay of staggering insight, which cuts to the heart of your very being, in an authorial voice which is mature beyond your years."

Nick > Tania

I really believe that school is valuable if it teaches you why knowledge is important.

School needs to inspire curiosity and provide a way to pursue it. If school doesn’t do that, I honestly don’t know what else it’s for.

I want them to see that school is worth it because they are worth it.

Nick has an epiphany ;P

I think this has to be the starting point for all classroom engagement.

The questions, ‘why does this matter?’ or ‘when am I ever going to use this?’ are legitimate ones and should be addressed explicitly by a teacher.

Nick:

The answer ‘all knowledge is valuable’ is the true and important one, but a kid won’t necessarily accept that on face value.

They need to see why knowledge matters by honestly and critically engaging with it, and examine themselves in the light of that knowledge.

Deep understanding of blogging as a learning experience for the teacher

Nick:

The reality of exams and assessment tasks, and teaching to the task is undeniable, but this shouldn’t be allowed to dominate a classroom.

This project is my rage against the learning-is-assessment machine.

Teachers doing, not just saying

We model writing by doing what we ask the

students to do.

Nick's post

Tania's post

Student gets it about online conversation

From the blog In Retrospect

Challenge: do something then write about it. Asking the important questions

Challenging assumptions, questioning stereotypes

Student:

In Western society today, the 21st century, a new kind of man is emerging. This man, surprisingly, is quite conservative, despite the thought social progressiveness of his society. To be brief, he is a coward, who will very easily conform to the existing norms of behaviour. We, for all our progressiveness, still cling on to the archaic model of masculinity; a physically strong man who is both authoritative and financially successful.

Online serendipity: metacognition of online behaviour

Go on, get lost

Making connections

Nick > boys

...and even though the

ideas taught in Maths have everything to do with lessons from Philosophy , we treat them like they're unrelated.

Student:

Connections strengthen as we grow older, because we experience more. With more experiences, there is more to connect to. Therefore we must make it our duty to be not only learning, but aware that we are learning, every day.

Only then can we constantly make connections to old thoughts, and to other old connections.

Examples of student blogs from other

disciplines

Natalie's studio: posting what I love and what inspires me Siena College

Art

Drawing of feather created using app Sketchbook Pro

Reflection and self-assessment

Natalie: If I was to do this again, I would try other materials

like oil paint or pencil to create different types of feathers and textures but otherwise I am extremely happy with this feather considering I only created it in under 45 minutes!

Sean Nash teaches important literacies in his biology ning

Thinking about learning in biology

Student: I've learned so much - not only about the

carbohydrates, lipids, and proteins but about how misleading the media is and how uninformed people are about their health, including myself.

Where to next? Further collaboration within the school Collaboration with students outside school, possibly from another country Bringing in experts for areas of interest Possible whole school integration of digital literacies and citizenship into learning and teaching

Year 9 English MSH blog link - http://9l-english-mhs.posterous.com/ Nick Fairlie on Twitter @Nickfairlie Tania Sheko on Twitter @taniatorikova Blog: Brave New World