Resonance in the Echo Chamber my Final thoughts on NECC '09

On of the very legitimate and accurate criticisms of developing online communities is that rather than being global and diverse they actually become rather homogenous. NECC emphasized that for me. This phenomenon is know as the Echo Chamber effect. We tend to connect with people online who echo our own perceptions and beliefs, we tend to seek validation. I prefer the term resonance and you will see why in a bit.

Resonance occurs when any object is vibrated at a frequency that matches the properties of that object. It is this trait that allows us to resonate water molecules with microwaves and to break wine glasses with sound. A dramatic example of resonance occurs when you put salt, rice, sugar or sand over a speaker:


Resonance allows for natural grouping. NECC is a conference full of other teachers who also are adopters of technology. Very validating! And very valuable!!! We need the validation and to find better ways of doing what we are doing!

The reason I prefer the term resonance is because I also am a firm proponent of dissonance. Cognitive dissonance must happen for people to feel compelled to understand. We want so badly to make learning comfortable, relaxed and warm that we fail to realize that unless we are confronted with the very real possibility that we are wrong we don't bother to consider new information. If you notice in the video the rice goes through stages. Periods where the whole is thrown into chaos. We need this. The pattterns can't emerge if the pattern is left undisturbed.

I loved this conference because it resonated with me. I also need some dissonance. Something to shake me up to make me reconsider. Something that will allow new patterns to develop.

Thanks NECC 09

Final Day of NECC 2009

This was an eventful final day at NECC for me. I attended some good sessions, including one by Dr. Lynell Burmark, author of Visual Literacy: Learn to See, See to Learn. Some of her work is included in UEN's course Effective Teaching with Visual Media. She talked about the importance of engaging our students' senses to make learning more powerful.

The highlight of the final day of the conference for me, though, was meeting some of my technology heroes: Jeff Vance, Jason Darby, and DT Holder of Clickteam. Clickteam is the company that developed and sells Multimedia Fusion and The Games Factory, which are two of the most revolutionary multimedia software products that (almost) no one has heard of. Jeff is the CEO of Clickteam USA. Multimedia Fusion and The Games Factory are programs that simplify the process of creating computer games (or other software applications) from the ground up. They make it possible to build your own complete computer game in as little as a couple of hours.

NECC 2009 has been a great conference and a wonderful experience.

Place Puzzles

At the TTIX conference a few weeks ago I learned about http://www.wherigo.com/ which allows you to go beyond simple Geo-Caching to creating tours with questions, quizzes and interactions. The comparison was made to the old Zork Games. I didn't really learn anything after the Zork reference because I spent the rest of the session googling for Zork so I could play it. My favorite Infocom game was actually WishBringer

Well, I did glean one fantastic element from both the session at TTIX and this session at NECC. Information has a place. All events occur both in place and time. We can use the connection between those three things to heighten learning. If learning is connected either to a real or a virtualized (ie: GoogleMaps, or Bing Maps) location it is more likely to be retained.

Bernie Dodge's session was worthwhile and valuable.

http://center.uoregon.edu/ISTE/NECC2009/program/search_results_details.php?sessionid=43728863&selection_id=48078760&rownumber=5&max=22&gopage=

Connecting Globally

One of the biggest ideas Ive encountered at NECC this year is the need to connect our students to the global community. Whether it was Malcolm Gladwell discussing the work ethic of the average Asian student, a debate about the need to close building and open open web 2.0 sites, or Alan November's thoughts on the decline of the American school system due to closing our minds and our borders - we need to think about ways in which we can learn about education around the world and follow others' lead in strengthening our curriculum.

So, what does this mean? Will all teachers Skype with colleagues from across the ocean? Will we share research with one another using Google Docs? Will we be sharing all student projects on YouTube? I know that these things are all possible, but how practical are they? Can I reasonably expect a teacher from Utah making connections with a teacher in Japan? Not sure.

I think the larger issue for Utah teachers is just opening themselves up to the idea of living in a Global Community. Whether we are in Kanab or Provo, we all exist as part of the WWW. How can we at UEN help facilitate understanding the global stage and the Utah teacher's place on that stage? I may not have the answer yet, but I know this is one of the questions I'll be working on when I get back to Utah.

Tweet Up Meet Up

I hope that those of you who read this find it funnier to read than it was to live.

I got invited to the NECC Tweet Up Meet Up! How exciting! I can get to know people face to face that I currently only know online. This will be great!

I am here with a bunch of colleagues and friends and their wives. My wife couldn't make it because she is actually in a class right now. They are not twitterers (or my personal preference Twitiots) Well, we went to dinner at Matchbox, which was exceptional and reasonably priced. The 6 of us enjoyed our meal and then procedeed to vacillate over what to do next. Most folks wanted to take a bus tour of DC. I suddenly found myself wondering about whether I was going to go to the Tweet up. But my morals prevailed. I want to practice what I preach. The relationships we forge online are as real and genuine as face to face relationships. I could only find out by actually going to this tweet up!

So, being a complete stranger to DC and befuddled by the remarkable lack of large mountains to act as landmarks (Why can't everywhere be like Utah with large mountains to delineate North and South) Well, I knew I was close and on the right street but being a technophile I decided I had better put the address into my GPS. Well let me say, you know how when you are going the wrong direction down a street and you notice the distance to destination is increasing and then the lady says "Please make a u-turn now" it takes longer for that to work when you are walking so....after 15 minutes walking the wrong direction and then turning around and walking back to two doors down from Matchbox. I finally arrived at The Rocket Bar.



View Tweet Up in a larger map

Jared and I have had a regular argument about what happened next. He has argued that relationships thrive best in the environment the first took root in. Online friends work best as online friends and f2f friends work as f2f friends and never the twain shall intermingle in regular life. I say that the online relationships we cultivate are as real, rich, and meaningful as the f2f.

Not so sure, about that now :-( I went to the tweet up, I don't drink, not beer, wine, coffee, teguila, heck I don't even drink caffeinated soda pop (very often) So being in a bar was a little uncomfortable for me and I didn't recognize anyone. And no one said Hi and I found myself feeling like I was back in Junior High at a school dance. It was a very weird experience altogether.

It did turn out better later. I ended up meeting @kellyhines, @edu4u and bumping into @shareski all face to face. On another note, I now have @garystager following me. It may just be our mutual distaste for SmartBoards, but I think we are going to get along. The actual TweetUp didn't work out so well for me, but I actually think it had to do with me. I was so far out of my comfort zone being at a strange bar in a strange city that going the extra step of talking to a complete stranger was just more dissonance than this little guy could handle (ok, little is clearly a relative term I am really only little compared to the Right Whale model in the @nmnh)

Really, this first try at a TweetUp was a success in the sense that I did something new, I tried. It didn't work out the way I expected it, but I will be joining another one when it comes around!

Luncheon with Alan November

Today Alan November spoke at a luncheon we attended. Mr. November is the author of Empowering Students with Technology as well as a new book called Web Literacy for Educators. His talk was about the challenge facing educators today, and the disconnect between what is important and useful for our children and what they are taught in school. One example he gave for this was Barack Obama's Internet campaign for president, which included the use of many Web 2.0 tools and other communication modes that are blocked at many schools. Alan said that this is the first presidential campaign in which the tools that the president used to win the election could not be learned in the school system. (I'm not convinced that candidate Obama's web presence was really what made the difference in the campaign, but it certainly helped.)

Mr. November spoke about the high percentage of new college graduates who return home to live with their parents. He said that this generation of students is being labeled the "Dumbest Generation." He said that part of the problem is that our students don't have an awareness of what their peers in other countries are learning and doing at school. He said from day one he would say to students, Okay, let's find out what students in Taiwan are learning about history. He also said that the debate about 1 to 1 computer access and other movements are misguided, because they are about the quantity of technology. Instead we should focus on teaching our students to communicate and work hard while using technology if it would be appropriate to do so. Instead of focusing on what technology equipment teachers and students need, we should focus on what information we need.

Bricks and Mortar: Standing on the common ground.

The panel discussion today was about the statement

Resolved: Bricks and mortar schools are detrimental to the future of education.

In my mind two people dominated the discussion: Cheryl Lemke (@LemkeC) and Gary Stager (@garystager) What Cheryl said resonated with what actually happened. No matter how different the sides are there is always common ground. Cheryl Lemke and Gary Stager were standing firmly on that common ground. From my perspective anyway they both seemed to be clamoring for improving schools and not abandoning them. Gary Stager pointed out that bad teaching is bad teaching whether it happens face to face or in a distance learning environment. Cheryl was lauding the importance of keeping the school as a center of learning for the community. This idea of improving our local communities by strenghtening the local ties and by connecting to diverse learning opportunities is a powerful one. The student rebuttal had one of the best lines of the day. In fact 2 of them. "I get excited not just about what I am going to learn but about who I am going to learn it with" and "My school connects me to my local community"

The question Jared and I discussed was "What does this mean for adult learners" What is the role of face to face socialization for adults who have learned the socialization skills and need skill training? I go back to my old argument. We learn from people we know care about us. All learning is emotianal We need the care and concern of people to carry out the fundamental purpose of education which is to change, specifically to improve.

NECC 09: Bricks and Mortar

We just left a panel discussion entitled: Bricks and Mortar Schools are Detrimental to the Future of Education. The conversation was an hour long debate with for and against moderated by Robert Siegel from NPR's All Things Considered. Each side made compelling arguments about the merits of online vs in person learning. In the end here's my take.

The most important thing I heard today was not about where we learn and teach, but rather how we learn and teach. Learning shouldn't be confined to a specific geographic building, but the building has a special place within our communities which facilitates communication between all people.

As someone who teaches both online and in person I feel there is no comparison with my ability to connect to my students when I am with them in the same location. Sure I can share information and provide instruction through the computer, but I can reach people and impact their lives when I am a part of the in person learning community. Does that mean this same community can't exist online - no, but my experience is there needs to be some type of in person sharing to truly identify with community at some point.

Mitchell and I have had a on going debate about the role of twitter. It exists as an online community where thoughts and ideas are shared, 140 characters at a time. I claim that it is difficult to create lasting friendships when everything exists in cyberspace. He counters that the relationships are just as meaningful as an in person relationship if you open yourself up those involved. A big part of NECC is socializing with our peers. While twitter provides us with an online socialization space, those involved at NECC with twitter had a meet and greet last night - in person. We have an innate desire to know each other and see one another face to face. Schools help facilitate this within our communities.

Online learning isn't going anywhere and I am going to be teaching more and more classes through this mode of delivery. My challenge is to figure out how I can bring the skills I possess as an in person instructor to the online world.

Multimedia Books using the CAST Book Builder

One of my favorite sessions at NECC today was "CAST Book Builder: If You Build It, They Will Read," which featured a cool, free web 2.0 book authoring tool. You can find the website at http://bookbuilder.cast.org/

Once you get a free account you can start combining text, audio, images, etc. to easily create online books. You can also use three different animated characters that you can "program" to provide guidance or feedback to your students. The characters could also be used as narrators of sorts. The site is definitely geared toward elementary school, and is easy enough for young students to use as well.

The CAST Book Builder follows the Universal Design for Learning educational framework, which encourages multiple means of representation, expression, and engagement.

NECC Day 2 For Me

Day 2 at NECC was all about the Science! I spent the morning in the poster sessions and then traveled (or is that travailed) through the vendor's area to get my Flash Drive.

The poster Sessions had some unique presentations and there were several specific projects which I link to at the bottom of this post but the overall impression I got with the science was that using technology to enhance science is about finding ways to do authentic science in your local area. Several projects had students identifying and then learning teaching about critters in the neighborhood.

After lunch I got into some BYOL sessions. Both were hosted by the producers of the shows from WGBH in Boston. I definitely like what they are up to. They have matched problem solving and engineering lessons with the PBS programs Fetch! and Design Squad. They emphasized the fact that they did all they could to make sure that the activities were low to no cost. As a former Science teacher who was always on a shoe string (as long as they were donated) budget I loved that feature about the activities. I also loved the dry humor of Dave Peth as he asked us to take our hands of our keyboards and actually do an activity. Doing activities in the session as another big plus. The Science and CTE teacher in me thrived on it. One of the activities was actually a simple version of an activity I have done in classes with students, just differently executed. Building Roller Coasters. WGBH's take on it was to use insulation, tape and a marble which was simpler than my vinyl tubing and BB's. But either way I got to use DUCT tape !!! (Yes it's duct tape unless you're talking about Duck Tape)What a great way to spend a couple of sessions!

NECC 09 Day 2

So far I've seen some really interesting sites and heard about some pretty cool gadgets. I don't know how this worked out, but I've stayed in the big ballrooms for most of the day. So, I've shared the love with about 200-300 of my best friends for every session I've been to today.

One of my favorite new websites was fur.ly. This one is a variation of tinyurl. Rather than letting you shrink a single url, this one lets you add several url's to a single address. You click on the one link and it immediately opens up tabbed browsing between to multiple url's you included. How cool is that?

I attended a cell phone presentation hoping to get some new ideas and I did. Geografitti.com was a big hit. Since I'm interested in both cell phones and gps/mapping this site is a marriage of the two tools. I can record my audio and upload it to grafitti and the site will mark my audio to a map. Another great site was textmemos.com. Here I can schedule a text message for a future time. What a great reminder to pick up the milk!

I know that I sometimes get drawn into the same old presentations, but I'm really glad I decided to check out Leslie Fisher's new gadget session. She shared a few old favorites, but mostly, new stuff. I think that tripit.com will certainly come into play next time I head out of town.

Hall Davidson is another favorite presenter at NECC. His presentation: 8 Things You Didn't Know About Video and 2 Things You Did (what a great title!) ended my day at the conference. While there were 4 things I already knew about video, there were a few things I learned. The best tool I saw that I haven't used is Quick Time Pro. For $30 this is a great editing tool. Glad I learned more about video for the classroom.

Well, my day at the conference is just about done. Let's see what we can do around the D.C. area tonight.

Malcolm Gladwell vs My Mom vs. Me

Ok, someone will undoubtedly do a brilliant analysis of what Malcolm Gladwell said last night. And they will be right, but in keeping my mookd I want to provide some counterpoint.

Malcolm Gladwell spoke last night about two different learning strategies.
1st Capitalization
2nd Compensation

Now without any clarification I think most of us could figure what each of them are. So I will give you only a small clarification from my perspective.

Capitalization is playing to your strength's! Isn't this what everybody's Mom told them. My mom sure did. She told me to figure out what you are good at and then do that. Thus.. I got a Biology degree after working on the farm with cows, horses, dogs, cats and all kinds of plants. Made sense when Mom said it made sense when Gladwell said it. These are the folk who keep working at something until they get really good at it.

Compensation is what happens when an individual doesn't have certain skills or abilities naturally, but compensates by learning other skills that enable him to achieve despite deficiencies. Gladwell spoke about the fact that many leaders are Dyslexic and it is the fact that they had to compensate for this deficiency in traditional school by learning to lead, delegate, and obtain content in other ways. Again, Mom told me when I was growing up that if I wasn't good at something I needed to work hard or figure out ways to do it anyway. I don't know if I am juxtaposing this correctly but Gladwell also pointed out that on average it takes 10,000 hours to master any cognitively challenging task. So....if I really want to compensate for my deficiencies it is going to take me on average 10,000 hours to learn that skill.

Now, me

I used to have students do a simple brain dominance test in my class. I would point out that with the information about what type of learning they were dominant in they could do one of two things.
Focus on their strengths Build up areas they weren't strong inSound familiar. It sure did to me when Malcolm Gladwell said it last night. It was good when Gladwell said it and it was good when I was saying it all those years to my students. This is an example of what is referred to as resonance or echo chamber effect. When I heard Gladwell I agreed with him and loved what he said because he became the expert confirming what I already knew to be true. (There's stuff there for a whole other post)

NECC 09 Keynote: Malcolm Gladwell

One of my favorite parts of the NECC experience is the outstanding lineup of keynote speakers they have each year. Five years ago I was introduced to Malcolm Gladwell at the NECC in New Orleans and to my delight he was our speaker again last night.

Gladwell has a unique gift of weaving together data from various case studies and sharing it to people in a down to earth and fun way. Last night he discussed the idea of learning theory in relation to the band Fleetwood Mac. What?! I know it seems like kind of a weird stretch, but the main idea of his message was that genius doesn't happen overnight. Even though Fleetwood Mac may have seemed like an instant success, they actually toiled in anonymity for years before they came out with the album Rumors.


So, how does this relate to teaching and students? Too often we think that something has got to work the first time we try it. In reality experts hone their craft over a long period of trial and error. The average expert in any field has generally invested over 10,000 hours or approximately 10 years of time to get to that level. Mozart started composing at age 9, but his first noted symphony didn’t happen until he was 23. Mark Twain took 9 years to finish the novel Huck Finn.

An interesting part of his message was the difference between Compensation and Capitalization learning theory and how it relates to our students. Too often we look at students and try to help them focus on their strengths when it comes to learning. The problem is we generally learn more from our mistakes than we do from our successes. Perhaps we should help our students recognize their weaknesses and provide them with opportunities to compensate for those areas by learning how to overcome their challenges.

It was a great keynote and a fun evening. After the keynote we went out to dinner and tried to get Ross to eat some Chinese food from Chinatown and well, he did eat some white rice. Still, it was neat to walk (and walk and walk) around town to see some of the interesting sites. Even if we didn’t actually get to the parts of the National Mall we wanted to see, we were able to work off our dinner.

Next Stop D.C.

Our bags are packed, and we're ready to go. When preparing for a cross country flight the only real question is:




or








Even technology can't change the age old question of good vs. evil.....

What am I expecting

This will be my first year at NECC. I am approaching it with mixed emotions. I am excited and thrilled because it looks to be a great few days. I am also more than a little overwhelmed. I followed Jared's lead and planned out my days with the NECC Conference Planner, but when I finally looked at it it was so packed with conflicts I don't know what I will actually make it too.

I am looking forward to the whole conference though and a chance to meet up with some of the folks I only know from the webosphere. I added my session plans into our uen@necc

Getting Ready

Many of us have been preparing for our trip to NECC next week. While the packing, traveling, and site seeing are all important aspects of our trip, I've spent the past day figuring out what conference sessions I'll be attending. Here are a few possible sessions:

• Tammy's Favorite Technology Tips


• Beyond Gathering: Converting Social Networking into Collaboration and Synergy


• Gadgets 2.0


• Eight Things You Didn't Know You Could do with Video


• The iPod Touch/iPhone Application Support Group


• Literacy isn't Enough: Building 21st Century Skills

It looks to be a great conference and I look forward to sharing insights from the road.

Here's my complete NECC schedule (so far)


UEN at NECC

We're getting ready for NECC this year and thought we'd document our trip for all of you. Find the latest links and browse interesting thoughts through our Twitter feeds. Read our insights through daily blog posts. View video of Ross' eating habits. All here, all for free, all for you.