All Students Meme

Recently I took part in a survey where I, and many other educators were asked this question.

" Do you believe that all students can meet standard?"

Hmm... this is a tricky question. Of course, as teachers, we feel like we should be able to answer yes. We believe in all of our students and have high expectations for them. But do we really believe that they all can meet standard? And what standard are we talking about? Perhaps I am naive, but I was shocked to find that a large percentage of educators answered this question no. They do not believe that all of their students can meet standards. In my naivete, I tend to believe that this is a lack of belief in how we measure students success and not a lack of belief in the students themselves. I want to believe that all teachers have high expectations for their students and hold them accountable for their progress.

This survey did not give educators and opportunity to share what they do believe about their students. This got me to thinking about that question. What do I believe about my students? Not just some students, or most students, but all students. I have decided to pose that question in the form of a meme. I am doing this for several reasons. One, because I feel like this is really an important question to ask of ourselves. It molds who we are as an educator. Also, I think that I need a little reassurance that this survey actually was measuring a lack of belief in how we measure students, not in the students themselves. And lastly, this seemed like a good way to meet the challenge posed to us by Steve Dembo in his 30 Days to Becoming a Better Blogger. This is a great way to invite conversation on something that I have great interest in knowing more about.


So here is my Meme:

1. Share three things that you believe about all students.
2. Reflect on your thoughts in your blog. (If you do not have a blog, you can share your ideas in a comment from this post.)
3. Be sure to link to this post and to where you were first tagged.
4. Tag your response with AllStudentsMeme
4. Invite others to join the conversation by tagging them to be a part of the meme.

I tag:

Teryl Magee
Christine Southard
Robin Martin
Silvia Tolisano
Carol Daunt Skyring
Ken Shelton

(I tried to tag some people I have not tagged before. All are welcome to join in the conversation.)



3 Things I Believe About All Students:
1. All students come to us with experiences and knowledge.

No child comes to us as a blank slate. As a teacher, it is up to me to make connections, even if I am not familiar with the knowlege or experiences of a particular child. I need to learn and then connect.
2. All students learn best when the learning is made relevant to them.

It is important that students know why they are learning what they are learning and that they can connect their learning to a real need in their life. (Why do I need to know this?)

3. All students learn best when their basic needs are met.

Students who know someone cares, who feel safe and well fed are able to focus on learning.


Note: The survey mentioned in this post has not been published at this posting, so I only shared it in generalizations.

Responses to this Meme:

Nicole Cox
Vicki Davis
Colette Cassinelli
Christine Archer
Elaine Plybon
Elaine Roberts
Andrea Hernandez
Rhondda Lynn Tristania
Carol Daunt Skyring
Jan North
Roxanne Glaser
Robin Martin
Rebecca Morrison
Janine Lim
Lori Colwill Pin It Now!

Why I Blog

As a part of the 30 Days to Being a Better Blogger Challenge, we were asked to share why we blog.

Here are some of the reasons I came up with for why I blog on Opening Doors to Digital Learning.

• I blog to inspire others to engage students in learning in new and powerful ways.
• I blog to expand on conversations when microblogging doesn't cut it.I blog to share new ideas.
• I blog to share my thoughts.
• I blog to show appreciation and amazement of others.
• I blog to reflect.
• I blog to try out new things.
• I blog to celebrate learning.
• I blog to share new ideas.
• I blog to get feedback
• I blog to open doors for my students and fellow educators.
• I blog to keep a record of what I am learning.
• I blog because I want to have a voice.
• I blog to share news.
• I blog because I can.

The last reason might seem a little silly. But I actually think that it is one of the more powerful reasons to blog. I have been journaling in some form since I was a teenager. When I started teaching, my journaling turned into letter writing. Because of a dear friend and my dear mom, those letters of my adventures in teaching around the world have been archived into stacks and stacks of notebooks. My mom has always said that some day, she would like me to take those letters and write a book so that all could share in my journey. Wow, I wish that blogging would have been a way to communicate during those years of my career. With blogging, I am able to share my journey. Currently, I don' t think that my blog is that riveting to read. The main objective here is to share learning and ideas. Not very often do I have tales of swimming with penguins, dodging bullets in Somalia or going on Orangutan releases any more. But if I did, I could and would share those adventures here. We all have stories to tell and things to learn from each other. Blogging gives us a place to share our adventures. I blog because I can.

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Power 2.0: The Power of Sharing

Since starting my new job in August, I have been anxiously awaiting my space on the web. Our district has committed a server for me to use to set up a collaborative space for teachers. The idea is to have a place that is not only links to resources and information, but a place where teachers can discuss ideas and share best practices. Teachers can upload resources, participate in forums, respond and create polls, reflect using a blog and collaborate with others on projects using a wiki. I know the power of my PLN and I am very excited about the possibilities of fostering the kind of open sharing of ideas and resources that I experience through my online Professional Learning Network.

I am thrilled that we are very near launching this interactive collaboration site. But I am also aware that this is not going to be an easy road. Teachers aren't just going to jump in and start participating in this new and dynamic way of collaborating. There are many reasons for this. The big one is time. I hear it all the time. I don't have time to be "surfing" the web. Another issue will be that the site will only be strong if it is truly a community of learners. If teachers pose a question on a forum and no one responds, they will probably not return. And one last reason that I think that the interactive parts of the site will be a tough sale at first is the fear of sharing. I ran into this issue a few years ago when we suggested that teachers post their story tests online or in a shared drive. I heard from several different buildings that teachers didn't want to share with other buildings because they didn't want to do all the work and then let others just have it. It was really important that this information be locked away and only those who they knew had worked hard to contribute should be able to take part in the sharing.

This idea of hoarding knowledge is part of our culture. It sounds very counter intuitive that teachers would be hoarders of knowledge. But there is perceived power in having exclusive knowledge. An idea that if everyone has the resources and access to the knowledge that they might not be needed.

Will Richardson recently wrote a blog article on just this subject. "The Less You Share, The Less Power You Have". In this era, when it would be so easy for teachers to share and collaborate with each other and not be continually creating the wheel, there is still this culture that doesn't want to share in this way. In part, it is a fear of their material (and hard work and time) being used by someone else and then losing value for themselves. For instance, if you share a great idea with a 2nd grade teacher and they use it in their class, then you, the 3rd grade teacher with the great idea will not be able to use it again in your class. In part also, I think it is a fear of putting themselves out there. When you publish your work, not only can people adopt your ideas and take advantage of your thought and hard work, they can also critisize your work. This is a scary idea for many. This fear of feedback is evident on many levels. I even heard someone ask me if they could disable the comments on their blog because they were afraid how people would comment.


This comment by Jason Levy puts a new spin on the idea that modern sharing is power.

Comment by Jason Levy
2008-11-18 16:18:17

I agree that modern sharing is power, but I think it is a non-traditional power.

Power 1.0 was the ability to hoard information, to own the process, to make a killing off of the initial public offering. That bubble busted.

Power 2.0: the power to influence practice, ideas and the world at large through the relentless sharing of tools, methods and insights.

If we really want to change the world, don’t we need to put our best ideals and resources INTO the world?

I love this idea of Power 2.0. The power to influence practice, ideas and the world at large through sharing. I am going to make this the theme of our new teaching and learning site. Power 2.0. The power to make a difference by sharing what you know and think with others.

Flickr photo by http://flickr.com/photos/creativecommons/

A reflection on the Power of Sharing from Langwitches. Pin It Now!

A Blog of Thanks

This is my 5th year blogging. For most of my time blogging, blogging has been a way for me to share what is going on in class with my students and their parents. My goals in blogging were really not to share great ideas or information to the world. Blogging was just a convenient, efficient and organized way to keep students and parents in my classes up to date and informed. I have also blogged to report on specific events like the blog I created to share our team journal from the Heifer Educator's Study Tour to Honduras or my blogs sharing about various sessions at conferences written mainly to inform the people who sent me that I had indeed used their resources wisely and the conference was well worth the time and effort. Last year, I started the Opening Doors To Digital Learning blog out of a deep desire to share what I learn from my online Professional Learning Network with those teachers in my own district. I was so excited about what I was learning, but felt frustrated with the fact that I didn't really have a place to share with those working in room next to me or the school across the district. I was collaborating and sharing with people on the other side of the world, but didn't really feel that I had a voice in my local community. This has changed a bit with my new position as Technology Professional Development Specialist for the district, but not really that much. I have comments on my blog from the other side of the world, but not one comment from someone working within my district even though that was the original focus of my blog. So as my audience has been defined, I have changed who I write my blog for. I now think about my online PLN when I share and not just about my local community even though, at some point, I hope that they will be a part of my audience as well.

As a part of the 30 Days to Being a Better Blogger Challenge that Steve Dembo is leading, I was challenged to write a thank you note to someone who encouraged me to blog or to someone who has encouraged me by linking to my site or commenting on my blog. The first people who came to mind were Dawn Mahler and Wendy Ragusa. Both of these ladies had children in my classroom. Every day, I was faithful to blog about our day in class and share important news. The blog went out as both an e-mail and a post to the blog. I could count on both of these ladies just when I would be questioning whether anyone ever read what I had taken the time to write, I would receive an e-mail commenting on the blog or asking a question that made me know that yes indeed, someone was reading. I would also find myself in conversations with parents in other classes or from other schools. When I would tell them my name, they would say "oh! you are the teacher who blogs! I wish all teachers would do that." So not only were these ladies and others actually reading my blogs, they were sharing the blogs with their friends. I have shared many times to both of these ladies what an encouragement they were to me.

I still don't receive many comments on my professional blog, but each one encourages me to keep on blogging. During the summer, I did a blog entry on Twitter vs. Plurk. I got 9 commnets on that one. (a record for me) Each from someone I really admire. The highlight for me was when Steve Dembo actually linked to that blog in something he was writing. Very exciting.

So, yes, maybe we start out blogging for different reasons, but knowing that someone is out there reading your blogs, commenting and participating in the conversation with you makes it all that much more meaningful and valuable. Pin It Now!

30 Days To Build a Better Blog

I have taken on the challenge to build a better blog in 30 days. Steve Dembo at Teach42.com has created this challenge to encourage us bloggers to spiff up our blogs. Today's challenge is to update my About Me page. I have several different blogs hosted on Blogger. When I jumped into this challenge, I found that I only get one About Me page for all of my blogs. This made it a bit more of a challenge. I think that what I might do is compose a new "About Me" post and then provide the link in a prominent place instead of using the "About Me" features provided by Blogger. But for now, I have updated my "About Me" information and information about the blog itself.

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