Get out the popcorn. Get comfortable!

Two Truths and One NOT

It's tricky to tell a lie, but I'll try. This is the way

Teaching EFL to Young Learners EVO 2017

conference participants introduce themselves. I hope you figure out the TWO TRUTHS I've shared with you. It's all about teaching to learn and learning to teach. Refresh ourselves at the Spring of Renewal.

The summer of 1972, I worked each evening at Medicalodge, from 11:00 pm to 7:00 am as a nurses' aide. My mother would pick me up after work, and we would travel home on a paved road that went straight to where we lived. We lived about 10 miles away.

One morning, I glanced up, and I saw a medium-sized farm truck carrying and dropping fresh ears of corn. My mother and I tried to get his attention, but he didn't see us.

We were Ruth and Naomi, the ancient gleaners, that day! I always enjoyed those crazy, fun, short moments with her. We worked out a gleaning plan. I would just lean out of the car, when she stopped, and pick up the ears of corn. We gathered enough corn for two meals for seven people. Today, it's still a great story, but only one of many gleaning adventures with my mom.

One of my favorite vacations  was the one I took along the Colorado River, from Hoover Dam, Las Vegas, and down through the Grand Canyons. I got a chance to see the rare fish called the Humpbacked Chub. That was quite an adventure.

In 1990, I attended my first internet supported NSF grant summer project. It was called GENE: Genetic Education Network for Educators. We  identified DNA, performed a variety of experiments with yeast as our most common lab creature. We used weevils, as models, in experiments, and all about Wisconsin FAST  PLANTS ( Ask about bee butts). It was a 6 week workshop. We worked from dawn to dusk to bring new, up-to-date curriculum for our students. It was a wonderful experience, and we continued to be in contact and share throughout the next five years.

It's tricky to lie, but I've tried to do it well. I hope you can figure out which is the lie. Enjoy.

Moodle MOOC8: Installing Resources in the Teacher Practice Area

SlideTalk Video: MM8-Week3-Moodle Activities for Teachers

SlideTalk Video: MM8-Week3-Moodle Activities for Teachers

Seven Correlates Of Effectiveness inTeaching

Synchronicity of the Seven Correlates

W hat directs the flow of effective teaching? What will make all the ideas, activities, books, resources, and lessons fall into place to be used effectively? How will teacher effectiveness in the educational process of students be examined and evaluated?

As a beginning teacher, I yearned to find THE ANSWER. 

There remained some elusive ingredient to being a great teacher. In my mind it was like the golden ring at the merry-go-round. If I just worked, studied, and learned enough, I could grab the golden ring of superlative teaching. 

As often happens with young people, this search began because I doubted myself. Even though I had wonderful grades, experiences and references, I was still trying to perfect myself. I still believed that there was ONE MORE answer...a magic key to effective teaching that I didn't hold. 

Why did I search for the magic key? I wanted to BE the best teacher in the world. I didn't want to doubt. I wanted to KNOW.

Being young, I thought there was always something else, some magic idea out there, that I didn't know. As time went on, I experienced a wider vision of effective education. I began to trust myself, my students, and the rest of my learning community.

I discovered there wasn't just ONE magic idea for effectiveness in teaching and learning. While there was still plenty I didn't know, I did figure out that no magic bullet can replace the effective basics that help people learn well. 

It took some time for me to stop looking for something that I already owned. It took some time for the competitive energy of the student to be replaced by the collaborative efforts of the teacher.

When I was new to teaching, I absorbed and experienced the positive impression of learning based on the Effective Schools research model, encompassed by the SEVEN CORRELATES OF EFFECTIVENESS. I learned these correlates at the knee of all the effective teachers, community members and family members who touched my life. They taught me! 

Yes, they taught me how a student centered learning community began, developed, and evolved over time.

Yearning to discover an understanding of the  arrival at the end goal of effectiveness, a destination, will never happen. That's not how effective teaching happens. It's all about the journey with your students, with your teaching peers, with parents, with school leaders, and the larger community.

Over the years, gathering more knowledge and experience, I learned what I really wanted. I really wanted to evaluate the effectiveness of my teaching within the ecosystem of my students' education. I really wanted to immerse myself in the learning process with them. The Effective Schools Research movement came to serve as a core set of organizing principles for my educational philosophy.

What are the Seven Correlates of the Effective Schools Research Movement?

1. Instructional Leadership
2. Clearly Stated and Focused Mission
3. Safe and Positive Environment
4. High Expectations for ALL Students
5. Frequent Monitoring of Student Progress
6. Maximize Learning Opportunities
7. Positive Communication - School, Home, Community      

Are these ideas that people could define or describe? Are these the ideas that you want to see in your school? In your teaching? In student's learning? Isn't this a support base for effective student learning? Isn't student learning what it's all about in our world?

For me, the short answer for all these questions is YES. How about you?

This is an updated version of my n2teaching Hearts and Minds blog article on Effective Schools Correlates: It's a Teacher's Life for Me.

Moodle MOOC 8 Week 1 - What is Moodle?

What I know about the intricacies of Moodle may be limited, but I do know the idea behind it came about at a time when programming languages were evolving to allow for programs that were less logic driven and more data driven. We wouldn’t have the richness of games, programs, and dynamic websites without object oriented programming.

MOODLE is an acronym for Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment. There is some talk that the M originally stood for Martin (for the original creator, Martin Dougiamas) While it’s a romantic tale, I think Martin began and named the process of  Modules, since they are a logical outcome of Object Oriented programming.

Moodle is the amazing open-source free software learning management system. It’s a learning management system like none I’ve ever used before. It’s intuitive, not clunky and complicated as Blackboard was when I first learned to use it. 

Moodle can be managed by the people who are actually doing the teaching, so you don’t have to wait days to get a response to an email about adding a simple application to the LMS you’re using. It seems that, for once, if I can think about adding something to my Learning Management System then I can.... with Moodle.

Moodle can stand alone as an e-learning management system, or it can be used as a suite of online educational tools to enhance the process of e-learning, including: blending, flipping, collaborating, and tailoring your environment to meet the needs of your students through your work as the teacher and manager.

During an earlier Moodle MOOC webinar, the idea came out during the class that Moodle is also a Teacher Management System. That’s true. I believe it is a logical consequence of being a dynamic, data driven system. The fulfillment of this idea may explain its successful use by teachers everywhere.

There is a depth of modules, blocks, and activities that seems overwhelming to me now.  That’s why I’m here in Moodle MOOC 8  to learn more about Moodle. Specifically, I want to learn so many topics like SCORM, flipping between online webinars to Moodle, and how to coordinate the whole process for your students and colleagues.

I found some interesting resources online, and I chose those that seemed most relevant. I selected those from universities, foundations, or schools.

You might enjoy reading the third source. It’s an interesting conversation in the Moodle Developer’s forum between Martin Dougiamas and a programmer working to add more value to the Moodle LMS at his school community. It’s very clear that these people really understand that open source is a wonderful way to access the minds of others who may have a cool idea that could improve Moodle even more.

Powell, T. (2011, 05). What is Moodle?. Getting to Know Moodle1. Retrieved 05, 2016, from http://www.kennesaw.edu/elearning/HowToMoodle/GettingtoKnowMoodle1.pdf

(2016, 05). Moodle. Wikipedia. Retrieved 05, 2016, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moodle

Martin, D. (2002, 12). Making Moodle More Object Oriented. Moodle Developer Forum. Retrieved 05, 2016, from https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=356

(2016, 01). How To Moodle. About Moodle. Retrieved 05, 2016, from http://www.howtomoodle.com/about-us/about-moodle/

Goyal, E., & Tambe, S. (2015). Effectiveness of Moodle-enabled blended learning in private Indian business school teaching niche programs. The Online Journal of New Horizons in Education–April, 5(2). Retrieved from http://www.tojned.net/journals/tojned/articles/v05i02/v05i02-03.pdf

Xiaojun, S., Yuan, J., & Xing, R. (2015). System design based on Moodle. 2015 International Conference on Intelligent Systems Research and Mechatronics Engineering. Atlantis Press, 2015. Retrieved from System Design based on Moodle

Moodle MOOC 8

I've joined a few hundred other teachers on Moodle4Teachers  and WizIQ for the Moodle MOOC 8.

There will be five weeks of relevant webinars that will be downloaded to Integrating Technology YouTube Channel owned by Dr. Nellie Deutsch, along with a variety of related activities to complete to help us learn how to use and maintain a Moodle site.

Finally, we will make a series of videos that relate to various webinars we watched or some aspect of our learning experience.

As the time goes by, I'll share the experience with you.