Last week I was blessed with the opportunity to teach a class as part of a summer institute for the New School‘s Institute for Urban Education (IUE). My class, Rebooting Pedagogy: Digital Tools for School Change, was one of three graduate classes offered to teachers who have been working with the IUE for the past year on projects for implementing school reform. These teachers, working in school-specific groups, have each committed to drafting a research question that they will then explore throughout the next year to see if specific changes at their respective schools can lead to increased student engagement and achievement. More on those reforms in a minute.
My class focused on helping teachers understand a variety of tools and social media platforms through which they can work collaboratively and network with others outside of their respective schools, while publicly documenting their progress for everyone to see. Some of the teachers had some experience with social media–nearly everyone was already on Facebook, and a few had Twitter accounts. But some tools (like Typewith.me) were new to everyone. And even those who had experience with Twitter and Facebook found there were still features these platforms offered or ways of using these sites that the teachers had not yet explored.
As the recent fight over whether educators should be able to “friend” their students on Facebook brought to light, educators and school administrators are still parsing out how much access students should have to the wide open Internet, and whether or not there’s a place for social media in the classroom. In hopes of keeping students focused on work and not play and to shield young people from potentially damaging, dangerous or inappropriate information, public school campuses block sites like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and … well … pretty much any site that might be the slightest bit interesting. Obviously, these blocks then make it difficult for teachers to take full advantage of the Internet in their classes, and that leads to students having fewer opportunities to engage with the kinds of social media that will help them foster connections and communicate with others in a professional, responsible way. Many of the teachers in my class expressed frustration with these policies that are increasingly becoming major impediments in reducing the digital divide:
Indeed–social media sites are increasingly changing the way we communicate, both professionally and personally. More companies than ever are using social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook as tools for recruitment, and it’s doubtful that this number will decrease as our teens and tweens grow into adulthood. Our students, then, need to begin to learn to use these tools. They need to know how to secure their privacy while creating a public self in a world that allows anyone to reveal anything and everything online. But those without Internet access at home often won’t have the chance to engage with these platforms and to learn all the ways they can be used. So it is especially problematic that teachers seeking to provide students with the opportunity to engage with Internet resources often don’t have the chance to do so when those resources are blocked at school.
And across the board, the teachers I worked with felt that the potential for tools like Twitter to help them advance change in their own schools and beyond by connecting with other educators all over the world, made them that much more committed to working with these tools and thinking about how to use them in their classrooms. And in fact, social networking may well be a key factor in helping these educators unite and thereby reform the rules that restrict Internet access at school.
As I mentioned at the start of this post, though, my class was not focused on teaching the educators how to use social media in their classrooms. Here’s the course description, from my syllabus:
It is no secret that there is a national conversation going on about education in this country and what “should” or “should not” be happening in our schools. Unfortunately, the perspective that is often left out of the conversation that is happening in the media is that of the teachers—the very people who know the most about what issues our schools face, why those issues can be challenging to fix, and what is needed in order to implement effective reform. In this class, you will learn to use digital tools and platforms (all of which are FREE!) to not only participate in the national conversation around education reform, but to shape that conversation and thereby help advance the work you are doing in your action research plans.
In other words, the teachers would be learning about social media, blogging, and essentially “building a personal brand” as educators in order to have a greater, more influential “say” in the various public debates around education reform. After reading, How Twitter Has Changed My Life, by Arianna O’Dell, many of them were inspired by the doors social media could open to them in that process:
The teachers also felt that documenting and sharing their work with others via their respective blogs could help those in their communities (as well as the general public) understand the challenges they face in the classroom and the triumphs they meet in the face of these challenges. Because of the ways they will be publicizing the work they are doing, these teachers will be allowing anyone who is interested to learn more about how and why they are undertaking these reforms in their respective schools. Some of the teachers are investigating the role of co-teaching and collaborative teaching, asking the question: If administrators make space for and encourage collaborative teaching, does student achievement increase? Another group is exploring whether student engagement and passing rates improve when students are involved in decision-making at the school. Still another seeks to understand how to help “over-aged, under-credited” students fulfill their requirements so that they can graduate from high school. And a fourth group will examine whether student learning is advanced when core academic classes incorporate arts education into their lessons.
To implement these reforms and then study their effects, the teachers will need to recruit their colleagues as helpers. Spaces like Facebook groups and tools like Typewith.me can help these educators collaborate and problem-solve in efficient and effective ways, without adding too much extra weight to the day-to-day intensity of managing up to 150 students, grading their papers and exams, meeting with colleagues, and reaching out to parents.
In addition to getting their colleagues on board with their projects, these awesome educators can use Twitter to engage with teachers at other school sites, for advice, guidance, and collaboration on best practices. And the teachers’ blogs will tie all of these things together, documenting their journeys and helping the public at large understand the complex and complicated nature of widespread school reform–because at the beginning, it is not “widespread” reform; it is small reforms that gain momentum and circle outward. As these teachers develop and cultivate an online professional identity for themselves and their projects, they will increase the circumferance of that circle. As one of my teacher/students put it: “It will be viral!”
