#HiveSummit Day 9 - Dave Burgess & Teaching Like a Pirate

Today I watched the 9th and last video from the Hive Summit. I am a bit saddened that it is over, but I've had a great time (even though it's been very hard to fit them all in - what with New Zealand being in the middle of term and all) and got lots of ideas.

This last video starred Dave Burgess of Teach Like a Pirate Fame where he talked about a variety of amazing ideas that any and all educators can learn from. He first started telling us about how he came to be where he is. A long time ago (or maybe it wasn't all that long ago) he was doing some great things in his class. But not many people knew about it. One day he decided to present at a conference and from there things started snowballing. He shared a lesson that he learned and that lesson is to share. Dave suggests that everyone should take a chance, be brave and present. By doing this, it makes you think and reflect upon what things you're doing that are awesome and amazing (and no doubt, everyone is doing something awesome and amazing). It's a chance to start a conversation and to help improve your own practice. In my experience, you don't need to have a perfectly formed idea to present, all you need is an idea.

Dave then goes on to talk about those ideas. Not every idea that you hear, even if it's a great idea, will be one that you want or need to adopt in your classroom. And that's ok. We are all individuals and all have different ways of doing everything. There is no one right way to do anything and as educators I think we need to embrace that. Learn about a lot of different ideas and then take the best of everything that will work for you. Mix and match. There are so many great ideas out there and so many ways to inspire children. Do what makes you the best educator that you can be. And don't forget to share the things you're doing so that others can take the best bits of what you do. I like how I summed it up in a tweet best:

Teach like you. Take all the amazing ideas and integrate them to be the best you that you can be. But teach like you. @burgessdave #HiveSummit

— Michael Davidson (@michaelteacher) August 13, 2018

He also talked about how often he would go to conferences to present, and how he spent a lot of his own money and time to get out there. That naturally led into a talk about what you can do if you can't afford that or there isn't anything near you. He talked of a ski and snowboarding resort that would sometimes not get snow. But when there was no snow, they didn't just close up shop. They made their own snow. If you don't have access to the community that you need to grow, make your own. Or join one of the myraid of online groups (that's been a pretty big theme throughout all nine videos) and join the community. These groups are not about listening to one person and everyone copying those ideas in the classroom. It's the mix of people that make the PD and the space what it is, not the person in charge. The main point is though, to find a group that works for you.

Some other great advice that was given in the talk was that at the beginning of the year you should spend the first few days on making your classroom or learning space a safe and exciting community. You want to make children so excited on the first day that they can't wait to come back on the second. Most classes (I know I've done this) spend lots of time going over all the minutiae of the rules and regulations but is that what you want children to go home thinking?

He also spoke about putting on a show. Often people get confused and think that you have to be "on the stage" all the time. But that's not what he's advocating. Spend a little bit of time on the show, get the kids hooked in (love the pirate analogy for this) and then have them doing the amazing things that will help them learn: collaborating, connecting and creating. He says, and I completely agree: "We want makers not memorizers; creators not consumers."

I have thoroughly enjoyed this talk and every other Hive Summit talk. I hope that I've managed to help amplify the amazing voices and ideas of those that were sharing. I'll leave you with what Michael Matera left us at the end of the video, because it's such a good message:

Be mindful, be awesome and always be in motion.

#HiveSummit Day Eight - Joe Sanfelippo & Hacking Leadership

I'm slowly getting to the end of the Hive Summit and I'm continuing to be inspired by the amazing people and amazing topics being discussed. The penultimate video has Joe Sanfelippo discussing ideas around Hacking Leadership, or how to be an effective leader. This topic is (like many of the other topics) near and dear to me. I am taking up one of my first official leadership positions very shortly so I'm looking for ways to help build something amazing.

In a very enthusiastic way (gung ho might be a better word to describe it), Joe tells us about three things that are important for leaders to do: Be intentional, open doors and build staff. 

Being intentional is something that leaders, whether you're leading a classroom, team, school or district need to think about. It means that you do things for reasons; that there's always a why to your actions and that why has to do with the results you want to achieve. A lot of this revolves around role modelling, but also includes making choices in when and how you do things. An example he gave was that in Wisconsin, many people would be watching Green Bay Packer games on Sundays. If you want to share on social media, some people would be sharing things at the same time commercials were on for the games - that way when people went to their social media feeds theirs would be the top stories. I think that example is the best because it just shows the cause and effect relationships between actions and desired outcomes. As a leader you need to think like this in order to help accomplish what you want. Be VERY mindful of how to achieve your lofty goals.

Opening doors is the idea that you need to share what you're doing and put yourself out there. This doesn't mean necessarily sharing what an individual is doing, but what the collective team is doing. It's never really about me, or I. It's about we and us. Letting the world know the things that are going on in your school is important to starting and continuing a dialogue.

This can be a very scary idea for many. There is a lot of judgement that occurs, but in order to accelerate our progress we need to share what we've done and what we're doing. There are many different ways to share, and not one is better than the other, though it does change your audience slightly. The point isn't which platform you should share on, but that you should share. Make things visible and transparent.

Building staff is very important. As Joe said in his talk, you need to make people feel like they are a apart of something bigger than themselves, like they are not isolated and like they have control of the direction of whatever organization they are a part of. There's nothing worse if you just go to work (or school) and someone tells you what to do and doesn't let you grow. Joe spoke of something that my new school is in the process of doing, and that's Passion Projects for staff. I can't push that idea any more. It's absolutely brilliant. I've been facilitating projects like this with students for years now, and it only makes sense to allow educators to do the same - but authentically, not based on someone else's ideas.

While watching this, I couldn't help but notice a huge link to the Project Culture Shift ideas that I've been learning about lately as well. The four main areas for that are: Collaboration, Agency, Risk Taking and Curiosity. I think the ideas that Joe spoke about in his talk align completely with this, and since I'm going to be a part of that, his ideas have helped me with some really good ideas and insights.

This was yet another amazing Hive Summit talk. There's only a few more days left to watch the videos so I urge you to do so if you haven't yet. And you're reading this and it's too late, look these people up, read their books, see what they're doing. There's tons of amazing ideas in this!

#HiveSummit Day Seven - Sarah Thomas & Connecting with Educators

The seventh day of the Hive Summit has brought the shortest video so far (which is great because I was able to watch it during my lunch 'hour'). In this video we got to listen to Sarah Thomas discuss making connections with other educators. I really believe in this topic and, to be honest, feel like this is perhaps the most important idea shared in the Hive Summit, solely because this summit would not even be possible if not for these online collaborations and connections.

Most people reading this probably have twitter (I think most of my readers come from there) so I don't know if I need to talk about how amazing it is as a platform, but perhaps there are those who don't know much about twitter chats.

Twitter chats are probably one of my favourite forms of PD, and not because I get lots of good ideas - and I definitely get lots of those. They're one of the best experiences for me because of the connections with other educators and the relationships I've formed through them. If you've never felt the joy of meeting a twitter friend in real life for the first time, you're missing out on quite a bit.

Twitter chats, as Sarah points out, can be quite a scary thing if you've never been to one. She related a story of the first time she tried to join a chat. She asked permission to join. Well no one responded to her so she took that as she wasn't invited. Thankfully, she kept trying and soon found out that you don't need to ask for permission and joined in. Now she runs her own chat. She talked a bit about getting on to twitter and some of the mistakes to avoid. As a new person to twitter (and I found this as well) it's easy to think that you need to follow everything and read every tweet. While that may be possible when you have 50-100 people you're following, but it soon gets to be too much after a while. Other people are worried about following too many people or getting too many people to follow them. Michael Matera suggested that no one should "fear the follower." Twitter is all about connections and the more you have the more rich your PLN becomes. You never know what any connection could lead to. You could be working with someone in your network - many jobs do come out of twitter connections.

At the end of the day, it is all about finding your tribe - the people who are on the save wavelength as you. The people you can talk to and that will push you to be the best you. But they'll also be there to support you. Once you find your tribe, you'll know. Without twitter (or other connections) it's pretty hard to do this.

Sarah has also stated EduMatch whose goal is to help connect educators with similar interests from around the globe. They even have branched out to other social media platforms, such as Voxer. They've had so many people join, they've had to create more than one group (because they've reached the limit!).

She finished with giving us some advice on what next steps we could take: The first bit of advice is to take advantage of online learning opportunities (like the #HiveSummit!). Share your thoughts, reply to others and find other ways to participate. The more voices, the more ideas. The more ideas the better we can all become. The Hive Summit is not the only online summit; there are educamps online. The in-person educamps are amazing, but sometimes you just can't get to where they are. Find one online and join in.

The second bit of advice was that if there isn't this opportunity for you, why not create it for yourself and others? Make the spaces where people can collaborate. Organize a way for like-minded people to connect, whether it be online or in person. These things would not happen were it not for someone or a group of people who spent some time and effort to make it happen. (And on that note, a BIG thank you to the organizers of the Hive Summit!)

The last bit of advice Sarah gives is that you should be prepared to have everything change for you. If you start connecting online, you'll start to think in different ways and learn new things. You will change. Learn to embrace that change. Since I've joined twitter, it's changed me constantly and continues to do so. I've not looked back since!

#HiveSummit Day Six - Michael Matera & Gamification

Another Hive Summit video, another day of my mind being blown wide open.  Today's talk was with Michael Matera and his daughter Mila, who was interviewing him. They spoke at length about Gamification in the classroom.

The first point that Michael made was that there is a difference between Gamification and Game-Based Learning. Gamification is using elements of games that increase engagement and enjoyment in the curriculum. Game-Based Learning is taking a existing (commercial) game and adding elements into it to make it more educational.

Michael gave many reasons why we schools should adopt gamification: It is naturally student-centred, it is iterative so it allows students to push themselves to become better and it's excited. My favourite thing he said though, had to be this:

Play has been happening forever. It isn't a pedagogy, it's a way of life. @mrmatera #HiveSummit

— Michael Davidson (@michaelteacher) August 9, 2018

I think it's really important that we add game elements to our teaching as well as play elements. I've had many discussions with people about play-based learning lately and I honestly feel that play is really just another word for learning. Gamification clearly falls into the same category. We learn so much, especially with a quick feedback loop which games and play provide, it doesn't make sense that we're not all trying to exploit these amazing ideas.

All of this fit perfectly in my view of what I was going to hear today. Then my mind got blown in the next part. You see, I had thought I knew what gamification is, and certainly I wasn't WRONG in my thinking. But I wasn't thinking big enough. I thought that gamification was playing games in the class. But in some places the game IS the class! That's right, the whole class is pretty much one big game. That's amazing. To be honest, I shouldn't be so shocked. I did read a whole book about a class that kind of did this in the World Peace Game.

So you can imagine that right now, being employed at a school that hasn't opened up yet and having lots of time to plan and work with others to design a whole curriculum and way of teaching, my mind is on overdrive as to how this can be used. I'm honestly incredibly excited.

Michael gives three big tips in the video for anyone wanted to start out:

1) Theme: Choose a theme for your game. This doesn't have to be the topic you're covering, it just has to be how you'll frame the game. You'll need to rename parts of the class to fit the theme. The more elaborate you are, the more interesting it will be for the children.

2) Team: Have the children work in teams. The bonds they make and the skills they learn from this collaboration will be more important that the points they earn. Keep track of points in as simple or as complicated a way as you'd like, but don't tie these points to actual grades and don't take points away that have already been earned.

3) Tasks: Have a lot of these, some required some not. Have side quests that students can complete to earn items in the game which might give them special abilities (eg, getting more points in a review game, being able to get an answer once on a test they don't know, being able to work with a buddy on something, etc). Give badges to show accomplishments as well as experience points (XP).

I honestly plan on having a good look at these ideas and trying to make some sort of a game for the new learners I'm going to have in 2019. In the meantime, I'm going to try to check out Michael's Book (Explore Like a Pirate), his Website of resources and his YouTube Channel:

I am truly inspired by this (and every other talk from the Hive Summit, which Michael has been hosting. I look forward to the last three videos and I imagine I'm going to have a lot of thinking about some amazing things soon.

#HiveSummit Day Five - Matt Miller & Using Technology Better

It seems that every time I get to listen to one of the amazing Hive Summit talks, two more have been added. I'm falling further and further behind, but the content continues to amaze!

The fifth talk was by Matt Miller, and it touched on a lot of things that I like already - but still somehow managed to expand my ideas and thoughts on everything. It just goes to show how we're all still learning.

The first part of the talk centred around what technology really is and how it is used in the class. Essentially technology is a tool that is meant to make our lives easier and more efficient so that we have time to do other things. We have gone a bit off course in a few different ways when it comes to this. All too often, digital technology is used a pretty much 1:1 substitution for textbooks or workbooks. Other times we teach only with the tech, thinking about what we can do with a new tool. We often forget that we don't just equip ourselves with one tool (a hammer, for example) and try to do lots of different things with it. We use a variety of tools to do a job. But also, sometimes we get what a previous session identified as functional fixedness with some tools and apps. We often think that we need loads of apps to do each different job. But sometimes we need to start thinking about how we can use one tool to do a lot of different jobs. The two previous ideas seem to contradict each other, but I think that the ideal is to find something in the middle: find a variety of tools, all of which have multiple uses.

Which brings me a very relevant part of the conversation for me: Google Slides. I've actually been asked to do a 30 minute talk tomorrow on all the different things I could do with Slides, so this is something I have been thinking about lately. Slides is an extremely versatile app. You can make stories with it (and include my other favourite resource - Lego):

You can do animations with them (just press play to start it): 

There are also a variety of other things you can do (hmm, maybe this is something I should do as a presentation somewhere). The point is that they are versatile. The other point is that even if you can't get a specific app (for example Instagram) you can mirror the experience in another app. You could use Google Slides (and have a page for each learner) and they could make an Instagram story on their page to show a moment in a book they've read, as an example. I really like this idea, and it sounds like something I'll be doing in the near future with the children that I work with - and maybe even the adults!)

The last part of the talk was devoted to discussing how to and why you should connect with classrooms around the globe. This is also something I have done a lot in the past, so I completely see where he's coming from. Matt and Michael Matera discussed to side effect benefits of doing these. Not only do children get a chance to see that they have similarities to children around the globe (Matt told of a story where on a call one child started doing the floss, which led to all the children doing the floss), but they also see that there are differences between them and others and that there are other ways of doing things or other ways of thinking. It opens children's minds and allows them to gain empathy. Plus they learn a lot when they're on the calls.

I obviously already drink the cool-aid that Matt is selling, so I'll echo what he has said (though he says it more concisely than I do). I think he's spot on that we need to find ways to leverage technology to make our practice better - to make things run more smoothly so we, and our learners, have more opportunities to learn and create and do.

I'll leave you with the advice he gave at the end of the talk: 

Safe teaching (not taking a risk, doing what has always been done) is actually risky teaching, because it's so easy for children to turn their attention switch off. When we're not sure what will happen, we get kids' full attention @jmattmiller #HiveSummit

— Michael Davidson (@michaelteacher) August 7, 2018

Be a maverick teacher. Take risks and change things up. There is so much value in trying something different, we'd be silly not to!

#HiveSummit Day Three - Rick Wormeli & Grading

Day three of the Hive Summit brought a very in depth discussion of grading and it's usefulness in the classroom with Rick Wormeli. Being in New Zealand, I do feel like we are slightly further along this journey than most, but Rick made it very obvious that there is still a ways to go - for me at least.

My first little issue though (and maybe this is just the difference in mindset) is that throughout the whole conversation, much of the language used centred around "grades" rather than "assessment." I think that in itself is a big mind shift, that maybe hasn't happened everywhere yet.

Rick opened his talk with a discussion about why grading is not only inaccurate, no helpful but often unethical. Most of us have probably been in a class where we're given quizzes and then tests. Many times these quiz scores are averaged out and then mixed in with the test scores to give a final grade. But the quizzes often test the same things as the tests, and if we're truly trying to measure learning, then why would we include our earlier, less competent versions of our work in our final grade. How is that an accurate assessment of what we've learned. He suggests going to a standards based way of assessing learning - ie are you able to do something or not. Often we get so caught up in trying to come up with a grade or mark (or level, in the case of NZ), we forget what the actual goal is. And sometimes teachers like to play 'Gotcha' or punish children with low grades for low effort.

Another point that was touched on was HOW to make the change towards a better way of assessing children. Though we want to move things forward, they are not things that happen overnight and can be fraught with lots of dangers on the way. The first step though, can be to fulfil the marking requirements of a school or district while still changing things enough so that the students' best interests are in mind. So for example, weighting things differently, or giving a minimum grade (say 50% is the lowest grade possible) so that actual progress or achievement is measured. The second thing is to start volunteering for committees that can make the changes needed. Stand up and be heard. A third thing to remember, is that if it comes down to causing political problems versus serving the students, you will have a tough choice. Rick says that his students' needs will win every time, and I applaud that.

As educators we need to focus on the positive, rather than counting errors and adding them up. What can a child do, and what do they need to learn how to do next? What could they improve upon and how can they do so? We need to help set goals alongside our learners and then celebrate when they achieve them.

In the end, with most things, it comes down to being a reflective practitioner. It means going out there, hearing different voices, seeing what people are trying, reflecting on what you're doing and why you're doing it. Ultimately we can only control what we do, so confronting others about their practice and backing them into a corner is no way to foster systemic change - in only creates resentment. Change is difficult and often it involves us feeling as if we've lost a part of ourselves. That's natural. But it doesn't mean that we should continue to do things that have negative consequences just so that we can feel good about ourselves and previous choices.

I probably have not done a very good job of summarizing this talk, so I suggest you go watch it yourself. There is great advice for everyone in there, no matter how far along you are in your journey to create authentic, accurate and useful assessment.

#HiveSummit Day Two - Carrie Baughcum & Sketchnoting

Day two of the Hive Summit included a talk about Sketchnoting by Carrie Baughcum. I was interested in this talk because I've slowly had my eyes opened with respect to Sketchnoting over the past few months and was keen to learn a bit more. And boy did I.

I used to think of Sketchnoting as something people would do to take notes during a conference. Then I started seeing notes everywhere and reading about people who had done them. But I never really thought much about them until recently, and I certainly hadn't really thought too hard about using them in the classroom as a tool.

In her talk, Baughcum told the story of how she accidentally became a Sketchnoter by drawing with her daughters at the kitchen table to running challenges on her YouTube Channel:

What was most interesting about the talk for me, though, were the discussions around 1) the benefits of Sketchnoting with respect to learning and 2) the idea that you don't need to be an artist to be a Sketchnoter.

Baughcum explains in the talk that as humans, we are very visual beings, and the visualization with the added kinesthetic boost from actually making the drawing helps us improve retention, comprehension and focus and also has a calming effect.  I shared this point on twitter and it started a conversation where the idea of people who don't or can't visualize came up:

I think we need to be flexible and allow for all modes of learning, but also help develop all modes of learning in every child.

— Michael Davidson (@michaelteacher) August 3, 2018

The more ways we can get information into the brain the more meaningful and impactful it will be.

— Carrie Baughcum (@HeckAwesome) August 3, 2018

I think Carrie's response sums up the whole idea. The more ways we can get children to understand something, the better their understanding will be.

The second point brought up in the talk was that you don't need to worry about the quality of your Sketchnotes. Sketchnoting isn't about the end product and doesn't have to be neat and tidy. It's about the process our brain goes through. She stresses that if you want your learners to have very deep understanding, you need to sketchnote alongside them, failures and all. If you're not a great artist, it may in fact be better as you can model the real purpose of the sketchnotes and help the children feel less conscious about the quality of their icons.

On a meta level, here's a sketchnote that was made for this talk:

I know that the next time I have my own class (probably February, so a ways away) I'm going to introduce sketchnoting. Thank you Carrie!

It was a very interesting talk and I would encourage all educators if they have the time right now to sign up for the Hive (Summit (the link's above) and have a watch of this and the other sessions. There's one a day for several more days, but they won't be up forever.

#HiveSummit Day One - Rabbi Michael Cohen

A few weeks ago I signed up for the Hive Summit, an online summit that would include several speakers over a week or two. You still sign up for it on the site.

The first video came out yesterday and featured Michael Cohen (no, not the one that's making the news in the US right now - Rabbit Michael Cohen, who was a keynote at ISTE recently). He spoke at length about Creativity, Design Thinking and Entrepreneurship.

It was an amazing talk to start off the summit, and I hope that future videos are just as impactful and inspiring.

Cohen first talked about the nature of creativity. He says (and I've thought this for a long time) that creativity isn't invention, it's the taking of existing ideas and putting them together in combinations that no one else has done before. His example is of Steve Jobs, who took a lot of existing technologies and combined them to make an iPhone. Cohen (and cohost Michael Matera) also argues that creativity isn't an innate thing, but that it needs to be practiced to be improved.

In a discussion around the 30 Circles challenge (where the challenge is to use 30 circles to draw everyday items in 3 minutes) he brought up the idea of Functional Fixedness. That describes the idea that often we think that something only has one use and one use only. We don't always see the different way something can be used and therefore cannot think creatively. However, once we discover our limitations it opens up our minds to different ways of thinking. This activity can lead to very rich discussions about what creativity is and how it can be fine tuned.

The second part of Cohen's talk has to do with Design Thinking (DT). This is something near and dear to me and has been something I've been working on understanding and implementing for the past year now.  Most people who learn about DT know that it centres around empathy and finding ways to solve a problem for someone else, or as Cohen puts it:  "Let me understand you, so that I can help you solve the problem for yourself." He goes on to explain that DT helps us build better relationships. Despite the obviousness of his statement, I had never actually thought of this before. DT makes us think about someone else's needs and helps us work with them. This is definitely something which will help frame my interactions with DT in the future.

In the last part of his talk, Cohen discusses building an Entrepreneurial Spirit amongst our learners. That simply means that we want them to have that grit and resilience to keep going when things don't work. To keep on trying things and trying things until we get where we want to get. He says that big things happen due to years of effort, but that we only see the end part of that effort. We miss the failures and the late nights and all the sacrifices and think that making something new is all about being famous and reaping the rewards of the hard work that we never saw. I tweeted out a quote from this part of the discussion and I think it's so relevant to everyone, especially schools. My future school also needs to look at this and find our own path to success and not be blinded by the amazing schools we see.

Don't compare your beginning with someone else's beginning. That's their success; they've been slaving away at it for a long time @mrmatera @TheTechRabbi #HiveSummit #DesignThinking

— Michael Davidson (@michaelteacher) August 1, 2018

This was an amazing talk and I recommend it for EVERYONE. Understanding the things Michael Cohen is saying is something that will help bring any school forward into the 22nd century and beyond. I am so excited to continue doing the things I was doing and adapting those new ideas he has given me.

Here's a sketchnote of  the talk (I didn't do it) that was included in the materials for the talk: 

If you haven't signed up already, I urge you to do so as this was an amazing talk! Watch this space for some more reactions to the talks that I watch.