Flipboard 2.0 FTW!

So here I am, day three of Spring Break, lounging on the beach in Oman with nothing but unreliable wifi and my phone to keep my mind active.  I am embarrassed to admit it, but my fingers have been trying to engage the phantom limb of my laptop since I arrived.  Today started with a bleak outlook.  Our snorkeling trip was cancelled due to choppy seas, and I forgot to charge my phone last night.  As a result, my phone kept interrupting a saucy tale (read on my iPhone Kindle app) of cyber-espionage and Saudi oil intrigue with regularity warning me of its impending death.  It was then that my  beloved Flipboard, announced its newest upgrade, Flipboard 2.0.  In the wake of the news of Google Reader's demise, this definitely takes away some of the sting.  The new and improved Flipboard 2.0 has a bookmarking function that allows you to create and share your own magazines.  It also allows you to bookmark items from... wait for it... browsers on YOUR COMPUTER, iPad or iPhone with Android soon to follow! They have also improved their discovery tools and connectivity with social networking sites and RSS by including hashtags, expanding searches, and allowing you to like, share, and comment directly back to the sites from Flipboard. 

Why is this great news?   I have always been a big fan of Flipboard.  I typically use it to browse through my Twitter feed when I am on the go or away from my computer.  Let's face it, the magazine layout is just so much more engaging and easier on the eyes, and it is quick and efficient.  ​While this allows me the mobility that I crave, a Twitter stream is still a Twitter stream.  Now you see it now you don't.  If I find something that is a keeper or that I want to save to read later, I still have to store it somewhere and bookmark it.  Before today, this required me to send the links to myself via e-mail or to Instapaper for later bookmarking on Pinboard. 

Now it is as easy as clicking on the '+' sign found in the bottom right hand corner of the screen.  ​Then you either create a new magazine or add the link to one that you have already created and click Add!  Voila!   

So now what?  Well for starters you can share your magazine with other users of Flipboard, via e-mail or the other social media sites connected to Flipboard.​  Try it out.  Using a device that has Flipboard, click on this link to the 21st Century Learning magazine that I created this morning.  You can find your magazines under "My Flipboard" by clicking on the Flipboard "flag" (or three black lines in the upper right hand corner) from any screen.  If you create a magazine you will find it in the "My Magazines" section, otherwise you will find them under "My Subscriptions". 

Once you have created a magazine, you can add to the magazine from any device as long as you have installed the bookmarklet to your browser.  Just open this link in the browser that you plan to use for bookmarking and follow the simple directions.  This will work for safari on iPhones and iPads as well.  When you click on the Flip it button on your tool bar, it will open a pop-up window like this: 

Just put it where you want and you will find it in the designated Flipboard magazine the next time you open it up in the order that the links were added to the magazine with the most recent post first.  ​Note that you can also create magazines from your computer browser as long as you have the bookmarklet. 

Though these are some exciting developments, Flipboard is still not THE answer for all of my networking and bookmarking needs.  Having said that, these are exciting developments and hopefully 3.0 is not far behind!  Flipboard R&D if you are reading this, take notes!  I am hopeful that the next release will include a web version, and more organizational control over the content.  I would also like to see collaborative contributions to these magazines.  I am happy to share what I curate from my Twitter feed with others, but it would be great if the readers could become collaborators and contribute their great finds as well!   ​

Alas, this is as far as I have made it with my exploration.  I am on vacation after all, my phone is charged up and my spy novel beckons!  Be sure to check out this article for more information, and let me know if you discover any other hidden jewels. Back to idle "bliss"!

Student Learning: A 21st Century Sci-Fi E-book

Remember when? This pic showed up in my Facebook feed this morning and it sent waves of terrifying flashbacks through me.  Incidentally, my mother was a school librarian, so you can imagine.  My heart started to race, my eyes opened wide...well maybe that was the coffee.  Either way, this is the form of "Googling" that I grew up with.  In fact, I immediately Googled card catalog images... and wished that I hadn't...back to the photo.  The reference card the girl in the picture picks up will most likely lead her to a book or research article with outdated information based on research carried out in a similar fashion. There will be no rapid connections made pointing her in new directions without opening a new drawer and sifting through a stream of unrelated or outdated resource references.  When I think about how I access information today, it doesn't even compare.  Imagine if the girl in the photo found out that within a couple of minutes, she could sift through endless volumes of current, relevant information, and contact experts across the globe to learn the information that she seeks without ever leaving her computer or picking up her land line phone.  At best it would be the makings of a great sci-fi tale, a Farenheit 451 or 1984 if you will.  Though this futuristic account of card catalogs would be frightening indeed, imagine if the situation were reversed and the sci-fi novel told a decidedly harrier tale, the disappearance of the Internet as we know it and a return to card catalogs and geographical isolation.   

This made me think about how we structure learning for our students.  ​In my last post about problem finders, I talked about Ewan McIntosh's design thinking school, NoTosh.  In his blog post about problem finders, Ewan states, " Teachers, for too long, have actually been doing the richest work of learning for their students. Teachers find problems, frame them and the resources young people can use to solve them. Young people get a sliver of learning from coming up with ideas, based on some basic principles upon which the teacher has briefed them, and the teacher then comes back on the scene to run the whole feedback procedure." 

Now I am going to make the assumption that all of you reading this blog exist on the tech savvy side of the learning continuum.  You are after all reading blogs on the Internet, and some of you were directed here from some form of social media or RSS feed.  As a teacher, do you define your own problems or does someone else find them for you?  Does someone else supply you with your resources for learning or do you discover them on your own? 

When asked why we do so much of the legwork for our students in terms of finding and framing problems and identifying resources, we usually respond that we don't have enough time, or they aren't good at it.  If that is the case, then isn't that the one skill that we SHOULD be teaching our students ?  As teachers, we need to reprogram our card catalog habits.  I propose that we write our own sci-fi novel; one where students are empowered to discover, research, and solve problems through prototyping using their special powers of information fluency and critical thinking.  

SPOILER ALERT:  In the end, these superheroes reverse global warming, cure cancer along with a host of terrifying diseases, bring peace to the Middle East, and force Justin Bieber and boy bands into obsolescence.  Well at least that is what would happen if I was the author. 

On that note, it is spring break and I am going to give this disappearing Internet fantasy a go! ​

Problem Finders: Tweaking KWL for the 21st Century

Hypertrichosis, the werewolf disease.

In my last post, I shared the new and improved version of the KWL graphic organizer, and how I tweaked this version for the purpose of my biology class.   ​I am in the middle of my genetics unit at the moment, and I was trying to come up with the best way to teach about transmission of genes.  Traditionally I would give the students a set of problems that requires them to recognize the connection between alleles, traits, and their mode of inheritance (dominant, recessive, codominant, sex-linked etc.) and then they would solve probability problems using Punnett squares and pedigrees.  However, I decided to challenge myself to find a more engaging approach that required students to question and think critically about the problems.  This is when I discovered this fantastic resource, a seemingly endless list of case studies that are nothing if not perplexing.  One great example of this is the Blue People of Kentucky.  It has all of the marks of perplexity that Dan Meyer speaks of, so I decided to turn my students into genetics detectives. 

Since this is an IB biology course, there is specific content that students are responsible for learning like sex-linked inheritance in hemophilia, multiple alleles with blood types, codominance in sickle cell anemia etc.  I selected five case studies for the students to investigate and began with the classic inbreeding royals example of hemophilia. 

A fabulously outspoken student that just arrived at ASB last year ​took one look at the first case and said, "Not this again!  This is only like the third time that I have studied this!"  O-U-C-H!  Fortunately, the werewolf and the rest were new and interesting to him, but he brought up a really great point.  One that I had already been thinking about after watching Ewan McIntosh's TEDxLondon talk a couple of nights before. 

You see though my intentions were to engage my students by providing them with authentic problems that were somewhat messy and difficult to solve unlike the classic problem sets, I DEFINED the problems for them which were indirectly DEFINED for me by IBO.  As Ewan states in his blog post, "Currently, the world’s education systems are crazy about problem-based learning, but they’re obsessed with the wrong bit of it. While everyone looks at how we could help young people become better problem-solvers, we’re not thinking how we could create a generation of problem finders."    ​

He proposes a model in which 20 to 30 global themes are presented and discussed and then the students began to gather information within and beyond the walls of the classroom and come up with problems that they would like to tackle head on.  This story ends with a prototype instead of a wiki.  I have actually informally proposed this course several times over the past two years.  Here is my vision:  

It starts with the book, High Noon: 20 Global Problems, 20 Years to Solve Them.  Students discuss the different global issues and then bring them down to a tangible local level.  Allow them to create interest-based teams of problem solvers and then mentor them through their research and prototyping.  With this course, students will begin to impact their world right now.  The graphic organizer for their course?  PKWHLAEN (I know, this is getting ridiculous.  It's time to abandon the acronym). 

P:  What problem in my local community ignites my passion to the point of ​action?

K:  What do I know about the variables that are affected by this problems or are contributing to its existence?  ​This would involve not only academic research, but also data collection from authentic sources and an evaluation of the problem in an authentic setting.

W:  What do I want to resolve about this situation?  What resources, including experts in the field and project participants, will I need? 

H:  How do I find out the information that I need to create a prototype that will attempt to solve this problem?  ​How do I contact the people whose expertise and talents will help to make my project a reality? 

L:  What have I learned through my research?  Can my idea become a reality or do I need to go back a few steps and change my plan? 

A:  What actions do I need to take to turn my ideas into a reality?  ​PROTOTYPE.

E:  Evaluate the prototype.

N:  What are the next steps?  Do I go back to the drawing board?  Do I share out my ideas and expand my protocol to other communities?  Do I build on what I have already done and tackle another face of the larger global issue?  ​

​In the middle of Christmas vacation, I received an urgent message from two students.  They wanted to call me to discuss a project idea that they had that would help bring clean drinking water to the slums of Mumbai.  They have now been doing independent research outside of school for the past three months.  Their idea has morphed from clean drinking water to designing a device that could help control the pollutants released into the air when people are burning trash.  A few weeks ago, they showed up after school to check out how the exhaust system works on the fume hood in my classroom. 

It sounds like I might have two problem finders who would make great candidates for this course.  I guess I just need to go ahead and make my proposal official.  

If you want to know more about Ewan's problem finder's mission, check out his lab! ​

LKWHQ: 21st Century Backwards Learning in Biology

Photo credit:  http://bit.ly/WwBGVw

​We are all familiar with the good old KWL chart otherwise known by my students as "Kills Will to Live" if I use it too often.  As teachers, we use it to activate prior knowledge in our students as they prepare to learn new material.  Recently there has been an upgrade to this chart to include the use of 21st Century Skills such as information fluency .  Allow me to introduce KWHL or if you are really serious, KWHLAQ!  Go big or go home! 

What do we know?  What do we want to learn?  How will we find out? What have I learned?  What action will I take?  What new questions do I have? 

​In science, KWHLAQ is a good outline of design labs and some projects, but it can easily be applied across other disciplines as well.  In fact the 10th graders at my school do a research project on controversial issues in history that culminates in an action based on their findings. This would be a perfect graphic organizer for this type of project.  We have recently been looking for ways to infuse information fluency deliberately into what we do on a regular basis.  This chart would be helpful for this purpose.  At the very minimum, we all need to be making the shift from KWL to KWHL, while at the same time looking for opportunities to add the action component wherever possible.  For a description of how this fits with PYP, check out this post incidentally written by the elementary school tech coordinator at ASB, Maggie Hos-McGrane.  Teach Thought, one of my go to blogs, also wrote a post about KWHL that you should check out.

I would like to propose two other models:  The first model I call LKWHAQ.  A backwards by design for scientific research intended to help students understand the scientific process better by studying what those who have come before them have done.     ​

The topic for class today:  Sickle Cell Anemia. 

Prior to class, students will preview a web documentary about the research led by Linus Pauling on Sickle Cell Anemia. 

Step 1 (L):  What do we know today about (insert topic) that we LEARNED from their collective research?  ​

At the beginning of class, we will go over what we know about Sickle Cell Anemia with regards to the specific mutation, the mode of transmission, and the impact of malaria on the allele frequency of this disease.  I will then give students an article published in 1949 by Linus Pauling.  

Step 2 (K):  ​Students will then summarize what they KNEW in 1949 and how they arrived at these conclusions.  (Note that this paper was published four years before the structure of DNA was discovered by Watson and Crick. This is yet another rabbit hole you could enter.)

Step 3 (W): ​I will then provide them with a second somewhat controversial article with racist undertones characteristic of the social climate at the time entitled, Data Pertaining to the Population Dynamics of Sickle Cell Disease (truly a fascinating read if you know the background and understand the science):  Students will then identify what the researchers WANTED TO LEARN?  ​We will also discuss their hypothesis before digesting the data. 

Step 4 (H):  HOW DID THEY LEARN?  This is a perfect place to address this question as electrophoresis technology had just entered the scene a couple of years prior to this research.  Students will then discover how they gathered and analyzed their data. ​What were their challenges and limitations?  We will also look at the bibliography to identify the research that formed their baseline knowledge.

Step 5 (A): We will then summarize and evaluate their conclusions based on what we know now about this disease.  Are they moving in the right direction?  What pieces are still missing?  What would they need to do to arrive at the conclusions that shaped our understanding of sickle cell anemia today?  What technology is needed?  I will introduce a third article entitled Population Dynamics of the Sickle Cell Trait in the Black Caribs of British Honduras, Central America.  With this we will discuss additional research done based on the findings of earlier research.  Their ACTION component. 

Step 6 (Q): Since our research brought us up to the early sixties, we will IDENTIFY THE QUESTIONS  that still remained based on our current knowledge and match this knowledge to the introduction of new technologies that would enable us to advance our learning on this subject. 

This type of exploration is perfect for topics like genetics.  Let's face it, today, we can find almost anything on the Internet.  By starting with what we know today and then tracking the progress of the research that brought us to these conclusions, my students will have the opportunity to observe science in its purest form and track the formation of ideas and concepts that we "know to be true" today.  They will  discover how the technology available at the time of research determined (limited) the extent of our knowledge, and then ponder the potential impact that future discoveries will have on our current knowledge base.  They will also be able to discover how the social and political climate can influence the research conducted bringing about bias as a limiting factor. 

At the very least, this is a much more interesting than simply memorizing the fact that a single base substitution mutation causes valine to replace glutamic acid in the beta chain of hemoglobin resulting in the sickling of cells in low oxygen pressure conditions.  Sometimes keeping it simple is just not the way to go.  ​

This post is already too long, so I will leave you with a teaser for my second proposed KWL adaptation.  This morning I watched a very provocative TEDxLondon talk called the Problem Finders.  Check it out and see if you can guess my new acronym.