PQ & CQ in Education and Final CEP 812 Reflection

In the final week of CEP812, we read an article by Thomas L. Friedman, published by the New York Times titled “It’s P.Q. and C.Q. as Much as I.Q.” In the article, Friedman discusses the great influence of technology on our society and discusses how in the last 10 years we have become “Hyperconnected”. He talks about the great potential of technology, but also the great problems that it has created. Friedman discusses the stress this technology revolution has had on the workforce and connected the unemployment issues with the growing need for technology skills.

 The technology skills Friedman talks about however is a more complex understanding of technology. In the article, Friedman references Craig Mundie, one of Microsoft’s top technologists, description about the problem. Due to the quickly changing and improvements to technology “the skill required for every decent job is rising as is the necessity of lifelong learning” (paragraph 5). Just understanding technology will not cut it for 21^st century workers. Friedman goes on to explain the qualities of a productive worker: “you will need to develop skills that are complementary to technology rather than ones that can be easily replaced by it” (paragraph 8). Finally, Friedman explains that successful and productive citizens need to be passionate and curious. “The winners won’t just be those with more I.Q. It will also be those with more P.Q. (passion quotient) and C.Q. (curiosity quotient) to leverage all the new digital tools to not just find a job, but to invent one or reinvent one, and to not just learn but to relearn for a lifetime” (paragraph 8).

This is exactly what TPACK Educational Framework intends to do. Teaching students to not only be problem solvers, but also problem finders. Giving students the power to innovate, critically think, and create provides students with some of these skills. Equipping students with the technological skills they need to connect, collaborate, and share their creations will allow students to become more active and engaged citizens.

For my final project, I have made an info-graphic, using Piktochart, to display how I demonstrate P.Q. (Passion Quotient) and C.Q. (Curiosity Quotient) in my profession and how I use technology to inspire students to be passionate, curious, and lifelong learners. Here is my INFOGRAPHIC.

In case you are a visual learner…

           

Curiosity Quotient (C.Q.)                              Passion Quotient (P.Q.)

 

As I reflect on the work I have done and the knowledge I have learned from CEP812 I think about solving complex & wicked problems by collaborating with my colleagues, limitations we face in finding solutions, and utilizing the “best” technological tools to improve education and meet the needs of all learners. In this course, I have probably done more educational and technological research than in CEP 810 and CEP 811. This process was important in helping me develop a better understanding of TPACK framework and how technological tools can help supplement learning of all students. Understanding the value in a participatory society and the necessity to teach students the importance of collaboration was laid out eloquently by James Paul Gee in The Anti-Education Era. In reading Gee’s work, I have developed a better understanding of “why people are stupid” and “the limitations we face in solving complex problems”. This information has helped me grow immensely as an educator and my understanding of how people interact and learn. I really enjoyed CEP 812 (Summer 2014) at MSU. I learned a lot and the time flew by. I really enjoyed collaborating with my peers our Wicked Problems Project and it was a great experience growing and learning with my group. I’m really proud of our final project and our F.U.S.E. Blended Learning Model of Education. 

 

REFERENCES

Friedman, Thomas (2013). It’s p.q. and c.q. as much as i.q. the new york times. Retrieved June 22 2014, from, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/30/opinion/friedman-its-pq-and-cq-as-much-as-iq.html?_r=0.

Gee, J.P.  (2013). The anti-education era: creating smarter students through learning digital learning.  New York, New York:  Palgrave Macmillan

Implementing Technology in the Classroom Survey Analysis

This week in CEP 812, I was able to connect with educators in my Professional Learning Network (PLN) and ask them to participate in a survey about how they implement technology into their classrooms. My survey was created using Google Forms and asked a series of questions about how confident they feel teaching with technology, the value of technology in the classroom, what type of professional development they would benefit from (in terms of educational technology), and what their views of the biggest problems in integrating technology into the classroom were. 

Initially, I was going to ask only teachers from my current high school. This quickly became problematic as I was sending out the form. I received many “auto-response emails” stating they were out of the office for summer recess. I decided to go to Facebook and utilize my PLN of classroom teachers I have met, collaborated with, and learned with throughout my educational practices. Of the data collected, 47% of teachers who participated have been teaching for 1-2 years.

I had 17 teachers participate in my survey and I have analyzed the data in this google document. I hope you take a look at the results and my analysis of the data. The survey was open from June 10th, 2014 to June 15th, 2014.

Here is a couple visual representations of the data I found. 

  Please feel free to comment!!!

Limitations in Solving Complex Problems

This week in CEP 812 we read James Paul Gee’s book, “The Anti-Education Era” to find out reasons that hold humans back from solving complex problems. This is valuable information for educators to know and think about when approaching teaching. Gee explains that we must use educational technology and critical thinking skills to teach students to solve extremely complex problems. Gee describes many schools that are merely involved with standardization and grades. He is very critical of this model of educating and does not think this will create life-long learners capable of succeeding in our ever-changing world. 

In my essay, I explain the limitations that prevent us from solving big, complex problems smartly. I focus primarily on chapter 7, “Pitfalls along Our Search for Status and Solidarity”, professional experience relating to this concept, and teaching solutions applicable to creating 21^st century learners based on my understanding of this limitation. I will explain a key problem with solving problems is our inability to value empirical fact and truth over our value of fitting in with social structures. I will explain this further in my essay. 

CLICK HERE TO READ MY ESSAY

Enjoy and feel free to respond!

 

REFERENCES:

Gee, J. P. (2013). The anti-education era: Creating smarter students through digital learning.  NewYork, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.

Maker Experiment #2: Universal Design Modified

Universal: (adj.):including or covering all or a whole collectively or distributively without limit or exception; especially:  available equitably to all members of a society. (Synonyms: Comprehensive, All-embracing, complete)

This definition, according to Merriam-Webster.com, describes a term usually used for remote controls, language, emotion, or philosophy. It is not often used in education. CAST describes transforming education through a “Universal Design for Learning” (UDL) mindset. They discuss this as a “blueprint for creating instructional goals, methods, materials, and assessments that work for everyone” (CAST.org, 2013).

 Universal is such a big term that sometimes it is more useful for me to think about a synonym and plug that into the title of this teaching method. Comprehensive or All-Embracing Design for Learning. This should be how we approach every single lesson. One of the biggest mistakes that all teachers make, usually when in a rush, is to plan a “one-size fits all” lesson. As I have learned, these are always my worst days teaching. The “one-size fits all” approach will simply not work for our students and some students may shut down or find no relevance in the content simply due to the structure in the course. One of the most ineffective ways to teach is by assuming that all learners will learn at the same pace and in the same manner. This is where UDL is extremely important. Providing multiple ways to engage with the content and reflect the material is essential in this process. If done correctly, each student will have a personal connection and experience with the content to reach the desired objective.

This week in my CEP 811 class, we were asked to explore UDL and learn about the most effect ways to implement this in the classroom. The goal at the end was to view our Maker Experiment #1 Lesson through the eyes of UDL, then revise it to make the necessary adjustments and improvements. To understand how to do this, I first re-examine my lesson and took notes based on how well I met the UDL Guidelines 2.0. There is three main categories to evaluate lessons: 1. Provide Multiple Means of Representation, 2. Provide Multiple Means of Action and Expression, and 3. Provide Multiple Means for Engagement.

I was pleased to see that my lesson did provide a lot of these principles already, but I did find room for improvement. Here is my revised lesson:

MAKER EXPERIMENT #2 (MODIFIED UDL LESSON):

• As mentioned before: This lesson is created as a follow up to the previous Entrepreneurship lesson, but may be used on its own to facilitate learning of these concepts.

Procedure:

Bellringer: As students enter the classroom ask the: How do you know how many workers to hire? Does more workers always mean more output? (Students should write their answers in their notebooks before the class activity starts.)

ADDITION BELLRINGER: Show a clip of an episode of ABC’s “Shark Tank” in order to give students relevant “real-life” examples of the production questions they should be asking in order to cut costs and get their product to marker. SHARK TANK VIDEO (ADD: 7.2Optimize Relevance, Value, and Authenticity & 2.5 Illustrate through multiple media.

1. Students are in Inventors groups (5 students per group)
2. NEW ADDITION: Add: 5.2 Use multiple tools for construction and composition by showing a video (provide how-to use video recap (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfQqh7iCcOU OR provide the HUMAN DRUMS Video as an example for potential use)
3. Each student must have a role in production/Conducting the charge
4. Students experiment to decide how many workers would be the best to maximize output.
5. Students start graphing:

• In the beginning we have our fixed costs (before we hire any workers).

i.     With 0 (zero) workers we get 0 (zero) output

ii.     Add one worker (labor)– Record data of output

iii.     Add another worker (labor) – record data of additional output

iv.     Add another worker (labor) – record data etc.

v.     Continue until all group members are laborers

• At this time, the addition of the 4th and 5th worker should be decreasing Marginal Returns and possibly NEGATIVE Marginal Returns (If not – continue adding workers with the entire class to show this principle)
  • If not doing the “Extension/Entrepreneurship project”, provide the HUMAN DRUMS simulation. Students must complete a simple beat in 1 minute (as many times as possible)
  • You might even try this activity with something like “Banana Bongos” or “Banana Space bar” and have each student have to add their hands on the banana.

MAIN IDEA: Eventually adding workers will decrease output because there is limited space and “Workers will be in the way of each other”.

5. Students work with group to discover what the ideal number of workers would be to maximize output.
6. Draw Graph and reflect on how we could hire more workers and keep the marginal benefits
   • Only way is to add more resources (more bananas, wires, connections, ect.)
7. Discuss findings and share results with class (include graph and chart)

ASSESSMENT/Debrief

• Students should discover the three stages of production: Increasing Marginal Returns, Diminishing Marginal Returns, and Negative Marginal Returns.
• Students should make a chart, graph and reflection on their experiment. In the chart it should look something like this: (The X-Axis will be # of workers, the Y-axis would be output/efficiency)
• NEW ADDITION: Add 8.4 Increase mastery-oriented feedback by giving students a reflection prompt that they will add to their “course blogs”. This is done to increase retention, encourage metacognitive approach to learning, and provide a formative check for assessing the objective. The question prompt will ask: What the correct number of workers are to maximize profits? And was the groups objective reached for the objective? This is also an addition of 9.3 Develop a Self-Assessment and Reflection.

Some of the UDL strategy guidelines that I was already achieving quite successfully in this lesson were: 3.1 Activating or Supplying background knowledge, 7.1 Optimizing Student Choice and Autonomy, 8.3 Fostering Collaboration and community, and 9.1 promoting expectations and beliefs that optimize motivation. The structure of this lesson is interactive and uses background knowledge because it is a follow-up lesson from a previous project. The entrepreneurship lesson gave students a creative voice and an opportunity to make a product. The lesson used groups of 5 students. This lesson will use the same groups and uses that knowledge to dig deeper in understanding of new concepts in Microeconomics.

UDL design has definitely improved this lesson. The biggest addition to this lesson is the self-assessment and mastery-oriented feedback assessment piece that I added through student blogging. Students’ blogging in the classroom can offer so many benefits that I am just now starting to learn. The options for collaboration are endless. In this particular addition students will be reflecting on their experiment, assessing what happened at each stage of production, and self-assessing their progress.

 

Blogging is also a phenomenal tool to show a formative check of learning. It is a way for students to reflect on learning and create a digital footprint of the experiences from the course. This will also provide for a way to create a course portfolio at the end of the course.

RESOURCES:

Public Domain CC0 (2014) “Blogging” [WEB IMAGE] Retrieved from: http://pixabay.com/p-327074/?no_redirect

CAST (January 6, 2010). [Video]. Retrieved from http://youtu.be/bDvKnY0g6e4

CAST. (2011). UDL Guidelines 2.0 – Organizer with links to examples. Retrieved from https://sites.google.com/site/udlguidelinesexamples/

Learning the Mandolin UPDATE

As mentioned before, I am learning the mandolin. The first step I had to do was to get the thing re-strung and ready to play. When I went into Marshall Music and to the back, I asked the instrument technician if he would sting it. He strung it up and then started playing a song and asked how I got interested in mandolin. I told him the story of how my project called for us to learn a skill using only youtube and help forums. I said I was having a tough time deciding and say a “dusty mandolin” sitting by the piano and thought “why not!”. He gave me the mandolin and said “well, good luck with that”. I knew he didn’t think I’d have much of a chance at success, but I will prove him wrong!

As I took it home, I knew it would be a challenge. The first thing I had to do was re-tune it. New strings tend to stretch quite a bit (I knew this from my experience as a guitar player). As I went to youtube to hear the pitches of each string, I found the guy I had watched when I first decided to take on this task, Brad Laird. In the youtube channel “Free Guitar Videos” Brad Laird does a great job of laying out the basics of learning the mandolin. He teaches everything from tuning the instrument to basic chords (video)  to basic scales.

I have made some excellent progress. I have learned a few different chords and I am getting better at transitioning between them. Playing scales has been a challenge. The instrument is quite a bit different from a guitar and the strings and finger movements seem even stranger to me. I do not know how much soloing I will be doing, but learning a song using chords to sing with should be possible at this point.

The Help Forums have been less helpful. A lot of the comments suggest: taking private lessons, buying beginner books, or focus on a style like bluegrass picking. Also individuals are experiencing problems that I do not have, such as strumming rhythms and staying on beat while playing with others in a band. There are many problems with playing in front of others and the instrument with both hands independently. I have checked many forums including, mandolincafe.com. I am not playing in a band or group so as far as I know, I am keeping good rhythm and staying in tempo while I am trying to play songs.

The story on the “dusty mandolin”

Ben Rimes commented previously about a “mandolin just lying around” and asked about a story behind this. The story I know is my mother received it as a gift from my grandmother. My mom plays the violin and had a desire to learn mandolin. The strings on a mandolin are tuned the same way as a violin, so she thought she could easily transition to the instrument. She quickly found out that the skill-set to playing violin and mandolin were much different. Violin is played with a bow and mandolin is strummed like a guitar. Also, the finger calluses needed for mandolin are different (mandolin is double stringed each note and has steel strings). The last bit of difference that made her give up was learning the chords in a mandolin. She was used to playing one note at a time, with violin, in an orchestra. As a result, the mandolin became a nice decoration to put near the piano and collect dust. UNTIL NOW!