Empowered Learner - January 2018 Issue

january 2O18

A PUBLIC ATION OF THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIET Y FOR TECHNOLOGY IN EDUC ATION

OWNING THEIR LEARNING HOW STUDENT-CENTERED LEARNING IS DELIVERING ON ITS PROMISES

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THE WORKFORCE OF THE FUTURE

HOW DO WE PREPARE TODAY’S LEARNERS FOR TOMORROW’S JOBS?

STANDARDS SPOTLIGHT

USE THESE TOOLS TO THRIVE AS A LEARNER, COLLABORATOR, LEADER

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©2017 Learning Sciences International. This form contains Learning Sciences International’s (LSI) copyrighted and proprietary content. This form and its contents may not be copied, reproduced, displayed or distributed, in part or in whole, for any reason without the express written permission of LSI. Learning Sciences International reserves the right to modify its products. 10-13-17 #LSI11-14 4 EMPOWERED LEARNER

CONTENTS

January 2018 Volume one Issue three A quarterly magazine

4 about us

5 iste in action

The role of technology in increasing access to learning

6 member voices

Jaime Donally Immersive tech is bringing new learning opportunities to classrooms

8 interview

’Father of the internet’ Vint Cerf

13 global focus

26 cover

Owning their learning

New role a game-changer for student, teacher digital literacy

14 feature

The workforce of the future

23 what works

Teaching digital citizenship without devices

33 standards spotlight

Use these tools to thrive as a learner, collaborator, leader

38 member profile

Robert Joyce

41 take action

Connecticut endorses ISTE Standards for Students, Educators

44 community voices

What is your favorite tool to address the Empowered Learner standard in the ISTE Standards for Students?

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executive editor Julie Phillips Randles director of editorial content Diana Fingal contributors Kristin Harrington Nicole Krueger Jennifer Snelling art director Sharon Adlis iste ceo Richard Culatta chief learning officer Joseph South iste president Mila Thomas Fuller, Ed.D. Assistant Director of Online Learning University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign College of Education iste past president Kecia Ray, Ed.D. Executive Director Center for Digital Education empowered learner advisory panel Trina Davis, associate professor, Texas A&M University, College of Education, College Station, Texas Patricia Brown, instructional technology specialist, Ladue School District, St. Louis, Missouri Ben Smith, educational technology program specialist, Lincoln Intermediate Unit 12, York, Pennsylvania Michael Graffin, STEM makerspace and robotics teacher, Iona Presentation Primary School, Perth, Australia Adam Phyall, director of technology and media services, Newton County School System, Covington, Georgia

The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) is a nonprofit organization that works with the global education community to accelerate the use of technology to solve tough problems and inspire innovation. Our worldwide network believes in the potential technology holds to transform teaching and learning.

ISTE sets a bold vision for education transformation through the ISTE Standards, a framework for students, educators, administrators, coaches and computer science educators to rethink education and create innovative learning environments. ISTE hosts the annual ISTE Conference & Expo, one of the world’s most influential edtech events.

The organization’s professional learning offerings include online courses, professional networks, year-round academies, peer-reviewed journals and other publications.

ISTE is also the leading publisher of books focused on technology in education. For more information or to become an ISTE member, visit iste.org. Subscribe to ISTE’s YouTube channel and connect with ISTE on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Our vision. ISTE’s vision is that all educators are empowered to harness technology to accelerate innovation in teaching and learning, and inspire learners to reach their greatest potential.

Our mission. ISTE inspires educators worldwide to use technology to innovate teaching and learning, accelerate good practice and solve tough problems in education by providing community, knowledge and the ISTE Standards, a framework for rethinking education and empowering learners.

Subscriptions. ISTE members receive Empowered Learner each quarter as a membership benefit. Members can purchase additional subscriptions for $49 per year. Nonmembers can subscribe to Empowered Learner for $100 a year. To subscribe, please visit iste.org/EmpoweredLearner or contact our customer service department by emailing iste@iste.org or calling 800.336.5191.

About Empowered Learner. Empowered Learner ISSN 2573-1807 (print), Empowered Learner ISSN 2573-2137 (online) is published quarterly by the International Society for Technology in Education, 621 SW Morrison Street, Suite 800, Portland, OR 97205, USA. Periodicals postage paid at Portland, Oregon, and at additional mailing office. Send address changes to the ISTE membership department at 621 SW Morrison Street, Suite 800, Portland, OR 97205, USA. Copyright 2018 ISTE. All rights reserved. The contents of this publication may not be reproduced by any means, in whole or in part, without the prior written consent of the publisher. Published January 2018.

For information on advertising in future issues of Empowered Learner, please email advertise @iste.org.

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ISTE IN ACTION

photo by s te v e smith

Richard Culatta on how technology can address equity gaps.

The role of technology in increasing access to learning Richard Culatta ISTE CEO In the book Abundance: The Future is Better Than You Think, authors Peter H. Diamandis and Steven Kotler make the case that opportunity gaps are often not a matter of scarcity of resources, but a matter of access to them.

They predict that exponentially evolving technologies will enable us to make greater gains in closing access gaps over the next two decades than we’ve made in the previous 200 years.

Nowhere is closing opportunity gaps more needed than in education. Let’s explore three ways we can use technology as a tool to increase access to learning: Access to learning resources. It’s no surprise that schools with more money can buy updated equipment and newer textbooks, while struggling districts cope with outdated books and learning materials.

By tapping into the wealth of knowledge available on the internet, technology can democratize access to high-quality learning materials and even free up funding previously used to pay for textbooks.

But access to resources goes beyond textbooks. Take, for example, the STEM School Chattanooga in Tennessee. Students there have access to a scanning electron microscope, and not because the school can afford the whopping $1 million price tag.

The school is connected to a gigabit internet network. Since the microscope can be controlled remotely, a team at University of Southern California, connected to the same network, put a high-definition camera on its scanning electron microscope, allowing students to experience science equipment their school could never afford. Technology provided access to learning resources that would otherwise be beyond reach.

Access to expertise. The geographic location of learners also affects access to learning opportunities. It can be difficult to find advanced math teachers or computer science teachers in rural or inner-city schools. That was the case in Omak, Washington, where an open position for a math teacher languished for five years.

But technology can bridge the expertise gap. Free videoconferencing tools give students access to a world of experts who can beam into their classroom, opening doors to learn from leaders in any field. Online learning programs allow students to be part of a global classroom by participating in courses their geographic location couldn’t otherwise support.

Access to personalized learning. It’s not uncommon for students to experience skills gaps – foundational learning concepts

they haven’t mastered. Absences, frequent school transfers or a difficult topic that wasn’t taught well can leave students behind because a critical building block is missing.

Technology enables personalized learning that can bridge this gap by helping teachers quickly visualize where students need extra support and recommend learning activities based on their individual progress.

When learning can be tailored to the needs of each student, those who need help mastering a particular concept are no longer left behind just because other students aren’t struggling with the same gap at the same time.

We have a lot of work to do to eliminate long-standing opportunity gaps in education. Every day, students around the world struggle to overcome geographic and socioeconomic barriers, racial and cultural injustices, and physical and cognitive disabilities.

Technology provides us with a powerful set of tools to increase access to learning opportunities to help close those gaps.

W hen these tools are wielded by educators who understand their potential, are supported in mastering them and are deeply committed to providing access to all learners, we can begin to overcome a false sense of scarcity and fling open the doors of opportunity.

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MEMBER VOICES

photo by s te v e smith

Jaime Donally shares tips for successful AR and VR implementation.

Immersive tech is bringing new learning opportunities to classrooms

By Jaime Donally

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Can you believe the explosion of immersive technology in 2017? We saw virtual reality (VR) spike with virtual field trips taking students all around the world. And augmented reality (AR) began ramping up again. These technologies have been around for a long time, so what happened? Money happened!

When companies see an opportunity for profit, they’ll seize every chance to get in on the benefits. There were key moments when AR and VR hit the niche in the market.

There’s no question that Pokemon Go found favor with students and adults, and provided many people a chance to see AR for the first time. The VR peak took place with the enthusiasm around Google Expeditions, free virtual field trips that can be experienced with a cardboard viewer. Students were immediately transported to places all over the world using cardboard and a mobile device.

These popular AR and VR experiences have put a spotlight on immersive technology, and it’s been a win for our students.

Have you heard the recent buzz around the new augmented reality apps made with the ARKit? The ARKit has supercharged

augmented reality and could be called mixed reality in situations where it’s used to blend real and digital environments. This technology recognizes spaces and provides boundaries for digital content to interact, such as operating with the walls of a room and finding flat surfaces where objects can be placed. Apple released the ARKit for app developers to unleash the possibilities of augmented reality.

There are many reasons the new AR apps are growing in popularity, and the new features make the apps more relevant to our daily lives. As this technology improves, we’ll continue to see an influx of student usage that will deepen learning experiences.

I believe we’re seeing the tip of the iceberg as these apps will become more interactive and engaging for our students to shape, mold and manipulate content within the world around them.

The new technology behind the ARKit gives us insight into the potential for educational apps. The apps use the camera to identify walls and flat surfaces in 3D space.

By knowing where the real objects in the

room are, it can locate digital objects in that space, making it seem like the digital object is really in the room.

In this way, the reality of the room is augmented with digital objects or characters.

The lighting is more authentic as it changes the color of the objects to match the surrounding light, making the experiences feel more realistic. For example, if students are viewing the anatomy of the human body, the pigment of the skin will change to match the room’s lighting.

Immersive technology is just beginning to get noticed in the classroom as a valuable learning opportunity. Rarely do I struggle to capture the attention of educators when sharing augmented and virtual reality; however, when it comes to the teachers including the resources in their lessons, many teachers don’t know where to begin.

Here are some suggestions for successful AR and VR implementation: Step 1: Don’t start with the tool, start with the struggle. Rather than finding the lesson that works with a specific tool, educators should be looking for resources that aid in the struggles their students face in the lesson. We should be inspired to find the tools our students need to be successful, and there are many.

Step 2: Use the tools you have. We won’t see a major shift in education using immersive technology if we’re expecting our classrooms to make big, expensive purchases to have access to it. This is a game-changer because we have tools, such as iPads and mobile devices, that are already available and familiar in the classroom. The device is flexible to provide more resources beyond just AR and VR, and can be implemented immediately without waiting for an approval, purchase or training.

Step 3: Move beyond experience into student-created content. We spend too much time spoon-feeding our students content. Whether we share information by

video, on paper or in an augmented reality experience, the results are the same. While we all begin with experiences in technology, there should be a natural transition for our students to begin creating the content.

Immersive technology is just beginning to get noticed as a valuable learning opportunity for our classrooms. Students live in a world where Snapchat filters and 360-degree videos are their norm, and our classrooms can be equipped with the same technology in learning.

If you’re ready to get started, you’ll find resources on my website at ARVRinEDU. com, on the ISTE Blog at iste.org/explore and by joining the weekly Twitter chat on Wednesday evenings using #ARVRinEDU. If you’d like support to put these tools into

practice, I’ve created several modules in Hoonuit.com with step-by-step instructions for using immersive technology tools. jaime donally is a technology enthusia s t who provides professional de velopment on trending technology topics. her l atest adventures include the startup of #arvrinedu, #globalmakerday and the hoonuit learning ambassador program. she's also the author of the upcoming is te book , le arning tr ansported: augmented, virtual and mixed re alit y for all cl a s srooms.

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INTERVIEW Vint Cerf says it's time to teach students how to learn, do.

Vint Cerf ‘ Father of the internet’ says critical thinking, doing should be focus of learning

By Julie Phillips Randles

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People expect big things from a man known as the father of the internet.

Vinton Gray Cerf – Vint to his friends – doesn’t disappoint. His vitae is riddled with the acronyms and accolades of a true geek, and his name has been on the visitor list at the White House since President Clinton.

You could say he was born for this role. His father was an aerospace executive whose career took the family from Cerf’s birthplace in Connecticut to California by the time Vint was 3 years old. A chip off the old block, Cerf was fascinated with all things mathematical, helping to write statistical analysis software for non-destructive tests of the F-1 engines for the Apollo program at Rocketdyne while still a student at Van Nuys High School.

But the young man’s childhood struggle became the catalyst for an even bigger career.

Cerf, who suffered from a hearing impairment, saw computing’s possibility as an alternative communications channel. So with his mathematics degree from Stanford University in hand, he accepted a systems engineer position at IBM and contributed to Quiktran, a FORTRANbased time-sharing system.

But he soon put corporate America on hold to pursue a master’s and Ph.D. in computer science from UCLA, and ended up in Professor Leonard Kleinrock’s Network Measurement Center group that connected the first two nodes of the ARPANet. It would have been impossible to stop destiny at that point. He teamed up with Bob Kahn, who was working on ARPANet’s architecture, and the partners designed the TCP/IP protocols and the architecture of the internet. Cerf and Kahn jointly pursued digital libraries, knowledge robots and gigabit speed networks. In a solo role, Cerf birthed MCI Mail, the first commercial email service to connect to the internet.

Likewise, he founded and served as president of the Internet Society (ISOC), has served as a commissioner for the Broadband Commission for Digital Development, was chairman of the board of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) for seven years, served as chairman of the American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN) and worked on creating a national edtech plan for the U.S. Department of Education in 2016.

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photos cour tes y of v int cerf

Vint Cerf says as the amount of information found on the internet multiplies in the next decade, students will need critical-thinking skills to help them distinguish good information from bad.

INTERVIEW

“Students will need to be taught critical thinking skills to distinguish good information from bad information.

The educational system will have to shift from measuring what students know to what they can do.”

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Since 2005, Cerf’s official title has been vice president and chief internet evangelist at Google where he’s become a popular guru with predictions on how technology will affect future society. To walk the talk, Cerf is working with NASA on the design and deployment of a deep space communications network modeled on the internet.

We did promise lots of wonderful geeky details (these accolades just scratch the surface), but Cerf certainly is not a stereotypical nerd. Dressed in his signature fashionable three-piece suit, he’s also found himself comfortably navigating Hollywood, serving as a technical adviser and even making a special guest appearance on Gene Roddenberry’s “Earth: Final Conflict” series.

During his leisure time, he appreciates a fine wine, loves gourmet cooking and – because you can take the geek out of Silicon Valley, but you can’t always take Silicon Valley out of the geek – enjoys reading science fiction.

We sat down with Cerf to get his take on a handful of current edtech topics.

What’s something you thought you knew that you found out you didn’t?

I thought I understood Newton’s Third Law (equal and opposite reactions), but then I learned about a strange phenomenon that a microwave emitter in a closed, asymmetric container produces a small but measurable force in the direction of the narrow end of the container.

There does not appear to be a good explanation for this, yet. It makes me think of the Casimir effect in which two metal plates, close enough together, will experience a force driving them even closer together owing to quantum fluctuations that are excluded from between the two plates owing to the narrowness of the gap.

Was there a teacher or mentor who influenced the course of your education or your career?

Yes, a fifth grade math teacher, Mr. Tomazewski, gave me a seventh grade algebra book one summer and I worked through all the problems and fell in love with mathematics.

You’re known for your predictions on how technology will affect the future. How do you think the internet will change in the next 10 years and how should the education community be preparing for those changes?

In 2017, the internet reaches about 3.5 billion people, a great many of whom access it via smartphones. In 10 years, that number will likely approach 6 to 7 billion. There will be much higher speeds available by radio (a billion bits per second is not unthinkable).

There will, of course, be 10 years’ more information on the internet. The quality of the information will vary as it does in most other media.

Students will need to be taught criticalthinking skills to distinguish good information from bad information. The educational system will have to shift from measuring what students know to what they can do.

For too long, our assessment of students and the success of the education system hinged on memorizing information and applying it; we should be evaluating how well students can find and apply information, assessing what they can do.

Students – all of us, actually – have access to a vast amount of information on the internet, How can we better teach students to vet and verify information, and is there a way technology can help with that task

Hearing aids have been hugely beneficial as has written communication (email, texting, captions on video). My wife has cochlear implants that enable her to hear after 50 years of total deafness.

I’m convinced that we can do a great deal more to help students with physical or cognitive disabilities through the application of suitable technology.

without restricting access to information?

That’s the question, isn’t it? The skill is called critical thinking and this requires students and citizens alike to ask about the origin of received information, its corroborating indicators, its credibility in the face of logic. Nothing should be taken at face value – not even things that appear to be conventional wisdom (e.g. neutrinos move at the speed of light and have no mass …

WRONG!).

One of the many advantages the internet has brought to education is the ease with which students of all ages can view and read millions of digitized historical records and

“I’m convinced that we can do a great deal more to help students with physical or cognitive disabilities through the application of suitable technology.”

artifacts. But as technology quickly advances, much of the software and hardware used to preserve and share these files may quickly become obsolete. How can we ensure these tools don’t go the way of the eight-track tape?

Does internet-accessible cloud storage solve this issue or is there more we need to do?

As someone who has experienced hearing loss, what are your thoughts on how assistive tech can help students with disabilities?

There is more to do – long-term preservation of digital information will require a coordinated effort to preserve old software and the EMPOWERED LEARNER

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INTERVIEW

“The first thing the students need to understand is the nature of the problem before they can consider solutions.”

ability to emulate old hardware on which older operating systems and applications can be run.

We will need business models to sustain long-term storage of digital information. We may need exceptions to copyright and patent constraints to allow users to run old software (e.g. in the cloud).

We will need a regime that supports copying of old formats into new ones that can be correctly interpreted by more modern software. There is a lot to be done. The cloud-based systems can be very helpful but are not the total solution.

minded people with interests in common with their own.

I hoped that students would learn to find and apply information from the internet.

The YouTube videos on “how to do X” for various values of X are prime examples.

More and more schools are teaching coding with the mantra being that teaching kids how to code will land them good jobs and provide a new path to the middle class.

Others say this premise is flawed because the world doesn’t need that many more programmers, and that teaching all kids to code will flood the market, driving wages

You’ve long supported innovative projects

down. What’s your take on this debate?

that attempt to find solutions to global

I think the purpose for learning to write software is NOT to become a programmer but to learn to THINK like a programmer.

How to parse problems into manageable pieces. How to solve each piece (with a program) and then integrate them back into a whole solution.

Analytic thinking is the key talent we want students to learn.

problems like the digital divide, the gender gap and the changing nature of jobs. Can you share some of the problems currently being addressed with technology? How can students get involved in solving today’s tough problems?

The first thing the students need to understand is the nature of the problem before they can consider solutions. For one thing, students will be living longer lives and their careers will be extended to perhaps 60 to 80 years! They will need to learn new skills and capabilities throughout their long careers.

Technology can help with online training and assistance to discover new knowledge, but students and citizens alike must be prepared to learn new things in the course of their long lives and careers. Crowdsourcing may become the avenue through which innovative solutions to problems arise.

What’s the next big technology that will transform education?

Cooperating artificial intelligences with which we can interact will help us find new information, organize work to incorporate artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning and general purpose computing to solve problems.

If you could change the way schools are structured in one fundamental way, what would it be?

In the 1970s when you were inventing the fundamental architecture of the internet, did you consider the role technology could play in education? What is your vision for tech’s role in education in the future?

I hoped that the internet could be one of several channels through which students could learn, could access myriad content, could discover new interests and like-

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Stop measuring what students can memorize and focus on teaching them how to learn and how to do.

GLOBAL FOCUS Roberto Baldizon on how role redefinition made all the difference.

New role a game-changer for student, teacher digital literacy

By Roberto Baldizon

I’ve been involved in leveraging technology in education on various continents for nearly 20 years. As a strategy leader of change and a consultant, I’ve learned certain “truths” along this journey: • Designing infrastructure for teaching and learning is different from a corporate approach, though not mutually exclusive.

• Adopting new technologies in the classroom takes time.

• Not everyone is at the same level at the same time.

• Provided with the right tools and support, teachers will rise to a new level.

• Though the majority of educators feel they’re “integrating” technology into their teaching, they’re only implementing it.

Ever since I partnered with a director of studies in the early 2000s in Mexico City to rid a primary school of various computer labs and created the position of technology integrationist, I’ve struggled with fully defining the role. We knew that separating technology and creating a set of classes for it wasn’t the correct approach. We didn’t want to create an environment where the tool was an aside from every-minute learning.

The technology integrationist’s role was therefore focused on supporting educators by teaching students how to use a tool with the classroom teacher in the room. Eventually, this model evolved into a natural partnership between the technology integrationist and the classroom teacher. However, in many cases, there was little innovation or

shift in teaching approaches. Much of what we saw in the early days was automation and repetitive (think keyboarding) tasks being done by students.

I’m now in charge of innovation and technology at an ambitious start-up school in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, called MiSK Schools. The school has adopted a project- and inquiry-based learning approach, is creating a maker-focused culture and is establishing amazing partnerships with innovative organizations around the globe.

Part of my own shift was to rename the technology integrationist role to digital literacy coach (DLC). The person we hired as our DLC was a tech trainer and coach who was able to frame the position in a new way and focus on the “why.” Our DLC learns about teachers’ capacities and interests, and exposes them to the tools that best suit the learning opportunities in the classroom.

Her priority is to find ways to get kids to make something rather than to do repetitive tasks, or worse, sit in front of a screen to consume.

Out of all of our DLC’s work, the most influential piece has been the creation of a Framework for Digital Mastery that uses the International Baccalaureate’s Essential Elements to Digital Literacies as a guidepost.

The main tenants are: • It’s not about how to use the tool but why, when and which tool is best to fulfill the need and promote collaborative learning.

• Teachers don’t teach digital technology.

They have to develop digital literacies to model them and to help students enrich their digital aptitude.

• Students don’t need to be taught how to use a tool. They need guidance, space and time to explore it and learn to transform their own learning with the help of a tool.

Articulating to teachers the why and the how has allowed them to recognize when they’re in implementation mode and when they’re in shifting-teaching-and-transforming mode.

After 20 years of trying to find the best formula for digital transparency, redefining the role and bringing in an outsider with a fresh pedagogical perspective has taken us to a new level.

rober to baldizon is the direc tor of innovation and technology at m i sk school s in riyadh, saudi ar abia.

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all photos cour tes y of allison shelle y / the v erbatim agenc y for americ an educ ation: images of te achers and s tudent s in ac tion

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FEATURE

By Jennifer Snelling America’s changing workforce played a huge role in the 2016 presidential election. Evolving jobs in coal and other industries mean our country faces a massive shift akin to the Industrial Revolution.

At the same time, fears about a “jobless” economic recovery have left many Americans questioning what the future of work looks like. ­­We can’t see the future by looking in the rearview mirror, but it does come into view when we visit today’s classrooms. We know we have to prepare students for the workforce, but what do the jobs of the future look like?

The Trump administration recently earmarked $200 million for STEM, computer science and coding. There’s no doubt these disciplines will be useful, but are they sufficient to ensure students are prepared for the future workforce? “[Teaching computer science and coding] is good advice for the next five or 10 years,” says Tom Vander Ark, author of Getting Smart: How Digital Learning is Changing the World and Smart Cities That Work for Everyone: 7 Keys to Education & Employment. “But most coding will be automated even five years from now. We are rushing to teach what will be ancient. In the long run, students must have

the ability to know and manage themselves, get along with others and attack complicated problems with empathy and understanding.

Those appear to be the only sustainable skills that won’t be subject to automation for the next 30 years.”

Automation, along with globalization, leaves many workers with an uncertain future. Education company Pearson recently teamed up with researchers from Nesta and the Oxford Martin School for a study called “The Future of Skills.” The study forecasts that seven in 10 workers are in jobs where there will be greater uncertainty about the future.

“In the U.S., there is particularly strong emphasis on interpersonal skills,” says the study. “These skills include teaching, social perceptiveness, service orientation and persuasion. Our findings also confirm the importance of higher-order cognitive skills such as complex problem-solving, originality, fluency of ideas and active learning.”

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In other words, the very thing that separates us from the robots, our humanity, will remain irreplaceable, says Vander Ark. Empathy, critical thinking, persistence and knowing how to learn will be invaluable.

The question for teachers, then, is how to teach these essentially human skills. If they are what makes us human, doesn’t that mean our students already have them?

To some degree, yes. But today’s schools, many of which haven’t changed much since the Industrial Revolution, are in many ways designed to “unteach” these very skills, says David Conley, Ph.D., professor of educational policy and leadership at the University of Oregon’s College of Education and founder of EdImagine.

Conley says the old skills for school success are compliance, punctuality, following directions, doing only what’s asked, focusing on goals set by others, gaining favor with teachers, not asking questions and learning without applying.

The new skills for workforce success will be initiative, independence, personal management, high aspirations/goal orientation, challenging conventions and assumptions, persistence, technology as a learning tool, help-seeking and tolerance of failure.

In other words, all the skills that make a successful entrepreneur.

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“Most schools teach that there’s a right and wrong answer for everything, so that there’s an increasing disconnect between the classroom and the world students are going to enter,” says Conley. “I believe this is a national crisis. We either do this or we’re going to be permanently underemployed.”

The following are three approaches to teaching digital age skills in very different ways:

Vander Ark suggests schools take entrepreneurial thinking and ask students to apply it to the most important problems of our time.

“With storms like Irma and Harvey, human systems and natural systems are colliding in unpredictable ways. Combined with urbanization, globalization and automation, kids are going to face waves of novelty and complexity,” he says.

“That’s why it’s important to introduce kids to extended meaningful challenges. It’s like handing them a world owners’ manual, both good and bad. For a teenager to really tackle a global problem, creating those real, authentic, community-connected challenges is the only way we can equip kids for what’s headed in their direction.”

The Workshop School in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, grew out of just such a mindset. Students at one of Philadelphia’s struggling high schools wanted to build hybrid cars and got the attention of

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President Obama when they entered an international hybrid carbuilding contest in 2010.

“They didn’t have a lot of money,” Obama said of the West Philly High team while unveiling a new education initiative. “They didn’t have the best equipment. They certainly didn’t have every advantage in life. But what they had was a program that challenged them to solve problems, work together, to learn and build and create. That’s the kind of spirit and ingenuity that we have to foster.”

The original car-building project was so successful that it morphed into an idea for a new school that opened in 2014. Students at The Workshop School get math and English in the afternoons, but the mornings are devoted to hands-on projects that integrate all the disciplines.

Through projects that include building cars, designing jewelry or producing a play, students fundraise for ad space, reach out to the community, engage in public speaking and set up web-based stores – all the skills that help a small business run.

Brandon Klevence, a teacher at the school, says the school doesn’t grade in the traditional sense. Rather, the adviser identifies skill sets, such as collaboration, public speaking and design process, and gives the students feedback.

“Being able to attempt a project and get to a space where you can talk about it, get feedback and learn from it is the goal,” says Klevence.

“Even the project fails, that is a success.”

In other words, while many of the classes may look like traditional career and technical education from the outside, The Workshop School is asking students to employ design thinking.

“These used to be considered soft skills,” says Vander Ark. “But now this is one of the most important dimensions of human capability. Perseverance – grit – is the most important bullet when it comes to human development and thriving. Persevere through difficulty and have the growth mindset.”

Whether we call it a growth mindset, way-finding ability, student agency or design thinking, the skill of being unafraid to try a project, fail and adjust based on the outcome will serve students well even if specific technical skills are achieved through automation.

You’d think at a school called High Tech High (HTH) there might be a lot of emphasis on coding and computer science. Instead, you find students building sailboats from the ground up or working with forensics to help inmates through the California Innocence Project.

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The school opened in 2000 as a small public charter school and has evolved into an integrated network for 13 charter schools serving K-12 students across three California campuses.

Like The Workshop School, High Tech High depends on hands-on entrepreneurial projects that ask kids to construct knowledge from a variety of interdisciplinary resources.

“All that information that we’ve been asking kids to memorize, we don’t need that. We have Google,” says humanities teacher Pat Holder. “The question becomes how do we use that information?

The 21st century classroom is engaging real issues and work that matters, making sure we incorporate relevant technology for engaging the world.”

Examples of projects in 11th grade biology include partnering with a biotech company that designs equipment to monitor vital signs. Students run clinical trials to measure blood oxygen levels and study heart disease. A second project has students studying infectious diseases and the importance of soap and hand sanitizer.

Students partnered with a nonprofit to provide hand soap to orphanages in Burma and produce graphics and cartoons to promote hand-washing.

“I don’t want to just give them skills for a marketable job, but the skills to contribute meaningfully to the people and places around them,” says biology teacher Kalle Applegate Palmer. “I want them to feel like their voice is credible and they have the tools to express

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themselves and interact in their future communities in a way that they can make an impact.”

An important aspect of HTH is that every 11th grader participates in an internship. Palmer, who supervises the internships, says she notices what skills students need while visiting work places and brings that back to her classroom. Students do everything from graphic design to carpentry to marine biology.

“When they go into the workforce, they’ve used the formal scientific protocol, worked with adults and have the ability to look things up and be resourceful,” says Palmer. “Internships are good immersive experiences to think about what they’re learning and how that applies outside of high schools.”

Rather than just memorizing pages of the biology textbook, students are asked to design scientific questions, think about credible sources and collaborate with each other on solving problems.

Ben Smith, educational technology program specialist and founder of EdTechInnovators, says one of the best things teachers can do for their students is ask them to go beyond problem-solving and become problem finders.

“One of the biggest shifts we can make is to be vague. When you’re implicit in the instruction, such as requiring a presentation with five slides, three references and two images, typically that’s what you’re going to get,” he says. “Challenge by leaving the assignment more open-ended and it that will bring out the best in students.”

Making connections to real jobs has been a focus of Oregon’s Thurston High School counselor Amy Stranieri. Through a partnership with the Technology Association of Oregon, Stranieri interviewed 106 employees at 10 technology companies. She asked computer technicians, as well as employees in all departments of the companies, what skills they used most in their jobs.

What did she learn? Communication, collaboration and, again, way-finding ability. “It’s not just about coding and computer science,” says Stranieri. “Communication, verbal and written, a deep sense of curiosity and an ability to figure out your own problems were very important. In school, students get dependent on teachers to tell them the way – a learned helplessness – they know they can wait out the answer. In any job if something breaks, you have to have the sense of urgency to get moving and figure it out.”

Stranieri, who also teaches a college- and career-readiness class, says she asks her students to play a lot of games with uncertainty, do a lot of writing and work in groups so they develop communication skills. She says these things frustrate her students sometimes. “They

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would love to just get a worksheet,” she says. “But learning is when they have to do something they don’t know the answer to.”

Thurston also partners with a school-to-work program called Elevate Lane County to provide job shadows and internships.

Opportunities for kids and teachers to observe and participate in the existing workforce are invaluable, says Scott McLeod, founding director of the University Council for Educational Administration (UCEA) Center for the Advanced Study of Technology Leadership in Education (CASTLE) and the co-creator of the video series, “Did You Know? (Shift Happens).” He recommends administrators find ways to pay teachers to take a day off and go visit job sites, and encourage teacher externships for a paid week or two in the summer.

“If you talk to science or math teachers, most of them don’t have a good sense of how their disciplines are currently used in occupations.

We need to connect educators to specific jobs out in the workforce across a variety of settings,” McLeod says.

The teachers who have started to do this have found that work in the classroom has changed because they are able to make it more meaningful and connected.

We can speculate about the ways our workforce will change, but we cannot know exactly what the future holds. What we do know is that design thinking, knowledge construction, communication and collaboration will help students find valuable, meaningful work no matter what the coming economy needs.

Our communities, parents and schools are facing challenges that are not well understood by politicians or policymakers, says John M. Eger, director of the Creative Economy Initiative at San Diego State University.

“A whole new economy based upon creativity and innovation is emerging. This is why, as I have said before, we urgently need to redesign our K-12 to focus on preparing students for this new competition if we are to survive, let alone succeed, in this new global economy,” says Eger. “The world is changing so fast, tech is changing so fast, people have to acquire new and different skills. What we need to do now is to learn how to learn.” jennifer snelling is a freel ancer who writes for a variet y of publications and institutions, including the universit y of oregon. as a mother to elementary and middle school-aged children, she’s a frequent cl assroom volunteer and is ac tive in oregon school s.

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WHAT WORKS A glimpse at some edtech success stories.

Teaching digital citizenship without devices

By Nicole Krueger

all photos by sally hannon

Over the summer, a group of preteens attended a camp to learn how to communicate online. They explored computational thinking concepts, practiced using social media and developed their media literacy skills.

And they did it all without a lick of technology.

Instead, they put on costumes and role-played social media interactions. They held up emoji sticks in response to each other’s “posts.” And the kids, many of whom confessed to clocking five or more hours in front of a screen each day, loved exploring their unplugged version of the digital world, says Carrie Rogers-Whitehead, CEO of Digital Respons-Ability, which runs digital citizenship programs for underserved student populations in Salt Lake County, Utah.

“It’s not about the computer,” she says. “It’s about the people behind the computer. It’s about how you interact with others. Communication is the same whether you click ‘like’ or hold up a stick.”

When Rogers-Whitehead launched Digital Respons-Ability a year ago, she wanted to take a more holistic approach to teaching digital citizenship. She developed her own data-based curriculum, drawing upon the ISTE Standards for Students as well as her experiences with teenagers as a librarian. Her

goals were twofold: Help kids develop their softer communication skills without the distraction of technology and gather data on digital citizenship education to guide future efforts.

She initially partnered with Salt Lake County Youth Services to provide digital citizenship programming for Title I students. During the summer, the organization ran its first four-week intensive camp, serving about 30 students. With more camps planned this winter, she hopes to reach 100 students by the end of the year.

Why does it work?

STUD ENTS CONNECT ON LIN E WI T H O F F L I N E BEHAVIOR. People often behave differently behind a computer screen than they would in person. By acting out online situations face to face, students learn viscerally that “what happens online happens in real life,” Rogers-Whitehead says. “It gets them to connect in their heads that what they’re doing online is the same thing as if they’re sitting in class and raising their hand. It has the same impact, even if no one can see you.”

THEY LEARN TO SELF-REGULATE. By requiring all students to unplug for a while, the camp helps them relax and take a break from “technology anxiety,” or the spikes in cortisol related to habitually checking their smartphones. In addition to modules on computational thinking, social media use and digital literacy – all taught via hands-on activities and role playing – the curriculum incorporates mindfulness training, such as meditative sensory walks, designed to help kids think through their communications and tap into their ability to empathize.

DATA HELPS ED UCATOR S R E F I N E T H EI R APPROACH . At the beginning and end of each camp, students take a survey designed to measure the effectiveness of digital citizenship education – a subject on

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WHAT WORKS

which only limited data exists. Although the survey sample is small so far, the results have already been illuminating. One hypothesis was that developing a better understanding of digital citizenship would help foster an interest in STEM careers. So far, the data suggests that might be true.

“I think digital citizenship is not just a one-off thing. It’s a mindset, a culture shift, a movement,” Rogers-Whitehead says. “We need more data-driven, intensive work behind it so it’s not just that one-off assembly or that mention in health class. Hopefully, this can help everyone.”

Turning to students for tech support When teachers at Burlington High School have trouble with their 1:1 iPads, they don’t turn to their limited IT department. Instead, they visit the studentrun help desk, where tech-savvy teens help them trouble-shoot problems and learn how to use apps in their classrooms.

Modeled after Apple’s Genius Bar, the help desk was developed to support the Massachusetts school’s transition to a 1:1 environment. Initially, students focused on helping teachers work out the kinks in their technology. But as teachers became more comfortable with the technology, the students’ role shifted.

“The kids have become like edtech consultants,” says Jennifer Scheffer, instructional technology specialist for Burlington Public Schools in Burlington, Massachusetts. “Now they’re focusing more on pedagogy. How can we leverage technology to impact student learning? How can we make the most of the iPad and all the apps it offers? How can we use it so it transforms learning?”

Student volunteers who are interested in technology earn credit through the semester-long class that’s offered during every period throughout the day in a central location near the library. When they’re not providing tech support to teachers who drop in, they’re busy making video tutorials and offering mini training sessions to show teachers how to use different apps.

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The help desk has been so successful other schools in the district have started implementing their own versions. The middle school now has a student help desk, and last year Scheffer started a similar program for grade-schoolers at Fox Hill Elementary.

Although the help desk functions differently at the elementary level where it isn’t a graded class, it still gives students the opportunity to explore their interest in technology while making a real contribution to their school community.

Why does it work?

I T’S A R EAL-WOR LD LEAR N ING EX PER IENCE .

Without standardized tests or state assessments attached, the help desk breaks the rules of traditional education. Students focus on solving problems, creating products and meeting teachers’ needs. At the high school level, they also spend 20 percent of their time pursuing their own independent projects, such as building apps or hosting TED-Ed youth events.

STUDENTS CREATE AND SHARE ONLINE . In the elementary program, kids learn by teaching. As they master different apps, they make video tutorials to share online – not just with teachers, but with a global audience. “I see so much social and emotional learning,” Scheffer says. “Their self-esteem is tremendous when they see work published and see that it’s impacting their school. The real-world digital citizenship lessons for these kids are so powerful.”

KIDS GET TO CHOOSE THEIR OWN DIRECTION .

As much as possible, Scheffer lets the students decide what they want to work on. “I don’t treat them like little kids,” she says. “I ask them, ‘What do you think is important? What do people need to know how to do?’ These kinds of experiences really let kids delve into their passions and interests.”

Students at Fox Hill enjoyed the help desk so much they couldn’t wait to do it again this year.

“I had kids doing work for help desk at home,” she says. “They were emailing me over weekend and sending me screencasts. It’s nothing they’re getting graded on, but they’re really passionate about it.” nicole krueger is a freel ance writer and former newspaper reporter. she writes about education technology and the tr ansformation of learning.

Find more strategies that work: iste.org/explore.

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WITH THE HELP OF TECHNOLOGY SHE’LL GROW EVEN MORE.

“

Ja’shyni’s teacher, Camelot Elementary School, USA

Read more inspiring stories at smarttech.com/customerstories.

Win a trip to ISTE 2018 by submitting your own story to smarttech.com/greatness EMPOWERED LEARNER

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COVER

OWNING THEIR LEARNING How student-centered learning is delivering on its promises

By Nicole Krueger Last year, a group of high school students wondered what it would take to govern a country. So they organized. They wrote a constitution. They set up an economy. And they ran their mock government outside of class all year long.

The project wasn’t graded, and they didn’t get extra credit for it. They did it purely to satisfy their own curiosity.

“This is the kind of project we see coming out of our content courses,” says Nicole Cerra, director of learning for Design Tech High School, a Burlingame, California, charter school focused on design thinking and student-driven learning. “It’s a lot different than just doing the reading and taking the test.”

Schools like Design Tech High are pioneering a new approach to education. They’re leveraging technology to create spaces where personalized, student-centered and project-based learning intersect – where students are handed the reins of their own learning and allowed to follow where their curiosity and creativity lead them.

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OWNING THEIR LEARNING

When students own their learning, it becomes more powerful than if they simply receive it.

They’ve cast off the old “sage on the stage” model for one that empowers students to take ownership of their education.

“We’re changing the culture of how teachers teach and how kids learn,” says Bart Rocco, superintendent of Elizabeth Forward School District in rural Pennsylvania, who has spent most of the past decade leading a districtwide transformation toward a student-centered environment. “If I teach somebody to do something, it’s not theirs to learn.”

When students own their learning, it becomes more powerful than if they simply receive it. That’s why for educators like Chris Lehmann, founding principal of the Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, student-driven learning isn’t a lofty ideal. It’s a moral imperative.

“We have a fundamental human right to agency,” he says. “It’s no more or less than that. If we want kids to be comfortable being active and engaged citizens of our world – and we need that pretty badly right now – we have a moral obligation to help them unlock that agency as early as we can.”

Student agency, in fact, is a key component of the ISTE Standards for Students. Standard 1, Empowered Learner, expects student to “leverage technology to take an active role in choosing, achieving and demonstrating competency in their learning goals, informed by the learning sciences.”

The standards also call on students to set personal learning goals, develop strategies leveraging technology to achieve them and reflect on the learning process to improve outcomes. In addition, they are asked to build networks, customize their learning environments and seek feedback to improve practice.

U.S. News & World Report has called student-centered learning environments “the schools of the future,” and in many ways, these forward-thinking educators are conducting a revolutionary learning experiment for the rest of the education community. What really happens when we let students take the lead? How does it affect their performance? Does student-driven learning deliver on its promises?

With most of these learning environments less than a decade old, the experiment is still in its infancy. Educators are still learning from their mistakes, reiterating and tweaking the formula. But proponents of studentdriven learning have seen enough to convince them they’re on the right track.

By almost any measure, from test scores to graduation rates, these next-generation schools are already outperforming their neighbors, Lehmann says.

“There are enough examples out there now that you have to work hard to say that this stuff doesn’t work.”

Student-driven learning in action

Just as no two students learn in exactly the same way, no two student-driven classrooms look exactly alike. Each school has its own unique approach.

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photo cour tes y of allison shelle y / the v erbatim agenc y for americ an educ ation: images of te achers and s tudent s in ac tion

“Student-driven classrooms can manifest in a lot of different ways,” Lehmann says.

“What it doesn’t look like is kids doing a lab where there’s a predetermined outcome.”

At Holy Family Academy, a studentcentered Catholic High School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where the majority of students are from underserved populations, students use each academic subject as a lens for exploring the social justice issues that affect their communities. And when they hit upon a problem they’re passionate about, they’re encouraged to leverage technology to solve it. They’ve used their school’s fab lab to make blessing boxes and place them outside local homeless shelters. One student programmed an app to help redistribute food to local families in need.

“Instead of shying away from topics that are controversial, we want our students to be part of the change and have the confidence to speak out in the face of injustice,” says Lisa Abel-Palmieri, head of school and chief learning officer. “They could read about it in book, or we can give students space and time to create a program or project.”

Students at Science Leadership Academy spend a lot of time developing their inquiry skills. They learn how to ask powerful questions and then create artifacts based on the answers they discover. Those at Design Tech High apply their design thinking skills to real-world projects, such as redesigning the entryway for their local library.

In most of these schools, technology serves as the vehicle for student-driven learning. It’s the link that connects their learning to the world outside. Students create and share artifacts on 1:1 tablets or laptops, using the media of their choice.

They also design and build their creations in high-tech maker spaces equipped with 3D printers and CAD software.

One of the most important hallmarks of a student-driven learning environment, however, is that students walk into the classroom knowing in their bones that they matter, says Angela Maiers, founder of the Genius Hour and Choose2Matter movements.

“Empowerment is not something you can assign or hand down to somebody,” she says. “It’s something you have to invite.

You have to orchestrate conditions where students believe they matter and the work they’re doing matters to an audience. Kids need voice and choice, I agree, but when you look at what empowerment truly means, it goes much farther than just giving kids choice. It gets down to the DNA of a school’s culture and character.”

Unlocking student agency

The benefits of student-driven learning may be palpable, but there’s no denying it’s a huge departure from what most students are used to. When incoming freshmen enter Design Tech High, many are confused about what’s expected of them. They sit down at their desks and wait for teachers to tell them what to do.

When they realize they’re expected to direct their own learning, “for the most part they’re really thrilled by it, but it’s also big ask of them,” Cerra says. Within a traditional learning model, “they’re comfortable and they understand the expectations. When the expectation is to solve a problem and they EMPOWERED LEARNER

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photo cour tes y of allison shelle y / the v erbatim agenc y for americ an educ ation: images of te achers and s tudent s in ac tion

OWNING THEIR LEARNING

Students need to be taught how to function in a selfdirected learning environment – and schools need support structures to keep them on track.

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don’t have a road map to get there, that risktaking is uncomfortable for them.”

Just like with reading or math, kids are all over the spectrum in terms of their ability to be self-directed. Sometimes they make poor choices. Some days they’re just not that motivated.

Many educators see it as a sign that today’s students aren’t ready to take ownership of their learning. But Lehmann passionately rejects that claim.

“I think everybody’s ready to take control of their own learning,” he says. “What’s the alternative? The alternative is that we don’t trust children. Or that learning isn’t for them. The general assumption has to be that kids are ready to take the reins of their own learning, because it’s theirs.”

It turns out self-directed learning is a skill like any other. Students need to be taught how to function in a self-directed learning environment – and schools need support structures to keep them on track. Learning needs to be scaffolded. Teachers need to be ready to intervene immediately when they see students making poor choices.

“The misunderstanding around selfdirected learning is that it doesn’t involve teachers making thoughtful choices about how to support kids,” says Adam Carter, chief academic officer for Summit Public Schools, whose campuses throughout California and Washington are structured around personalized learning.

“We have to instill in learners the ability to grow the skills, mindsets, behaviors and dispositions to be able to direct their own learning. There’s a lot of scaffolding and intervention that occurs on way to getting to that point. Like any muscle, it’s the product of a lot of time and attention. It’s not like flipping a switch.”

At Design Tech High, students check in with an adviser once a week to help them focus their self-directed lab time, with selfdirection coaches ready to step in when they need more intensive support.

Holy Family Academy created a fulllength core class for freshmen that teaches them how to learn in a student-driven environment.

“It’s taken a lot of trial and error to figure out what level of support students need,” Abel-Palmieri says. “Once they get it, they figure out how amazing it is.”

The real question, Lehmann says, isn’t whether students are ready to direct their own learning. It’s whether students are truly being served by traditional modes of education.

“I think kids are more ready for this than they are for what we currently serve them,” he says. “Better this than sitting and listening to someone lecturing you all day long. I don’t know anyone who’s ready for that.”

Helping teachers make the shift

Make no mistake: These educators aren’t wearing rose-tinted glasses when they talk about student-centered learning. They’re on the front lines of the revolution, and they’re

the first to admit it’s harder than the current way of doing school.

“You have a whole new set of skills to teach kids, as well as a redefined role for yourself,” Carter says. “Learning anything new requires an investment of time. It’s unfair and impractical to say to a teacher that self-directed learning is the cure for all that ails you. It’s not true. You can work just as hard in a self-directed learning environment.

But you’re also going to see results in the kids’ learning. It’s not easier, but it’s much more effective.”

Student-driven learning requires teachers to profoundly rethink pedagogy. One of the biggest challenges for teachers is simply making the mindset shift.

“This is a radically different approach to thinking about what learning in schools looks like,” Lehmann says.

To support teachers through the transition, schools need to provide plenty of professional learning so they can develop the new skill sets required to help students

direct their own learning. At Design Tech High, for example, teachers get eight weeks’ worth of half-days for training while students take elective classes taught by industry professionals.

Because early intervention is so crucial, teachers need to be able to easily spot when students are struggling – and to do that, they need data. Summit schools use a personalized learning platform that collects information through assessments designed to draw out key performance indicators. For example, did the student look at learning resources before taking the assessment? Did they submit formative work before turning in a final draft?

By examining these types of learning behaviors, the platform can pinpoint students who are less likely to succeed.

“In version one of personalized learning, which is what we’re just now emerging from, we have a tremendous amount of information about the product, process and progress of student learning,” Carter says. “We’ve

tried to package that information to teachers, administrators and coaches into clear, easyto-use dashboards.”

As teachers become more responsive to this type of data, they end up re-envisioning their role as curriculum adapters rather than curriculum developers. Instead of creating new course content, they find themselves spending the bulk of their time adapting existing materials to students’ needs. This requires extra time for planning lessons, collaborating with colleagues and talking through their challenges.

That’s why Holy Family Academy designed its schedule to allow ample prep time, requiring students to participate in offcampus internships so teachers can spend a solid eight hours a week on planning.

“Making the transition is a lot of work,” Cerra says. “Setting things up so students can take ownership of their learning requires a lot of thought. For the first couple years it’s almost like being a brand-new teacher again.”

Assessing the intangible

One day, a student walked into Elizabeth Forward High School with an idea. He wanted to build a canoe. He spent hours in the school’s fab lab digitally fabricating the vessel, eventually testing it in the swimming pool to see if it would float. It did.

It was a huge moment for a student who felt like he never really fit in at school, Rocco recalls.

Those are the kinds of transformative experiences student-driven learning can enable. Unfortunately, “they’re not captured in reductionist assessments,” Cerra says, leading many educators to struggle with questions around how to assess self-directed learning. Is it rigorous enough? Will it show up on tests?

“Those who do the work know its 100 percent rigorous, but how do you assess it?”

Abel-Palmieri says. “Unfortunately, we still EMPOWERED LEARNER

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have most universities and lot of parents who think rigor is a score on the ACT or SAT or a multiple-choice test at end of the semester.”

To truly measure the success of studentdriven learning, educators need to radically rethink assessments. Maiers, for example, is working with Ph.D. students from the University of Georgia and the University of Denver to create the first algorithm for evaluating how much a person understands their own potential and significance. Known as the mattering quotient (MQ), it has the potential to help students combat the feelings of insignificance that often go hand in hand with poor academic performance.

“Our biggest desire beyond food, water and shelter is our desire to matter,” she says.

photo cour tes y of allison shelle y / the v erbatim agenc y for americ an educ ation: images of te achers and s tudent s in ac tion

OWNING THEIR LEARNING

“This has the potential to do what emotional intelligence (EQ) did 30 years ago.”

Even if technology can’t yet quantify the true value of student-driven learning, that doesn’t mean it isn’t there.

“It’s the harder choice, not the easier choice, for educators to make,” Carter says.

“But it’s ultimately the right choice because it’s about treating kids as individuals.”

We want to highlight your work with the ISTE Standards.

If your school or district has adopted the ISTE Standards or is planning to, let us know so we can support your process and recognize your efforts!

Share your story and inspire others in their work with the standards. iste.org/StandardsAdoption

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nicole krueger is a freel ance writer and former newspaper reporter. she writes about education technology and the tr ansformation of learning.

STANDARDS SPOTLIGHT Kristin Harrington shares tools to support the ISTE Standards for Educators.

Use these tools to thrive as a learner, collaborator, leader

By Kristin Harrington

The ISTE Standards for Educators challenge teachers to become leaders, creators and facilitators of dynamic or transformative student learning. What I love most about the new standards is that they view educators as professionals who drive global change and continually reflect on their practice.

Great teachers understand the need to develop a network for support, resources and collaborative planning. They reach beyond their classroom walls to build a global network of educators in similar positions

who have shared interests and who challenge their beliefs and ideas.

This article dives into a few of the ISTE Standards for Educators and the tools to support deepening your professional practice.

Building your global network The ISTE Standards for Educators offer a blueprint for building a global network.

The Learner standard asks teachers to “pur-

sue professional interests by creating and actively participating in local and global learning networks.” The Collaborator standard elaborates on this, encouraging teachers to “dedicate time to collaborate with both colleagues and students to improve practice, discover and share resources and ideas, and solve problems.”

When I started my career, teachers were just beginning to share ideas and resources in online forums. This type of collaboration eventually moved to social media sites such

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STANDARDS SPOTLIGHT

You can jump on anytime of day or night, your network is global and the tools are free.

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as Twitter, blogs and newer tools like Voxer and SnapChat.

Educators who embraced those tools quickly realized the many advantages of using social media tools to collaborate. You can jump on anytime of day or night, your network is global and the tools are free.

If you’re just getting started, here are just a few of the tools you can use to build a global network: Give Twitter a try. If you haven’t used Twitter, or only use it to follow celebrities, you might be skeptical about its power as a source for professional learning. Don’t be. Every day, educators tweet thousands of fresh ideas and resources, collaborate on projects and support each other.

The trick is to learn how to use hashtags to find the information you’re looking for so you can ignore what you don’t need.

Whether you’re interested in #PBL, #STEM or any other education topic, you can search the hashtag and find information on Twitter.

Don’t like tweeting but want to find out what others are talking about? Join or

follow an education Twitter chat, which is essentially a real-time discussion about a specific topic occurring during a set time.

Participants use a unique hashtag so others can easily follow the chat.

You’ll find a Twitter chat, or ed chat, for almost any subject area (#SciChat, #SSchat); job role (#CPChat); or education topic (#Spedchat, #digcit chat). Find a calendar of educational Twitter chats at participate.com/chats.

If you really love the tweets of a specific account, person or group of people, you can create a “list” of specific users. Still want to follow Kim K. and Beyonce? You can create a private list only you can see.

Check out Voxer. If a lack of time is the reason you aren’t networking with other educators, Voxer may be the tool for you. Voxer is a walkie-talkie app that educators use to have conversations about shared interests.

There are Voxer groups for podcasting in the classroom, makerspaces, edtech coaching and many other topics. You have the option of talking or typing, and you can listen while driving to and from work.

Although not totally private, Voxer is a lot less public than Twitter, making it a great forum for asking questions about things you’re struggling with in your classroom or school.

Don’t overlook edcamps. If you prefer face-to-face collaboration, edcamps may be your style of networking. These “unconferences” are organized by teachers and are offered in cities all over the world, with sessions chosen based on what participants want to learn or share that day.

Edcamps usually take place on Saturdays and include enthusiastic and innovative educators who are excited about sharing ideas and leave inspired to make changes in their classrooms. They also offer a great way to strengthen relationships with educators you collaborate with online.

STANDARDS SPOTLIGHT

Visit edcamp.org to find locations in your area. If you don’t see one near you, consider gathering some colleagues to host an edcamp of your own.

Using Twitter and Voxer as well as attending edcamps has transformed my career by providing me with fresh ideas, inspiration and lifelong friends. And the more than 20 ISTE Professional Learning Networks will help you collaborate on the edtech topics you’re interested in and connect with like-minded educators.

By breaking out of the bubble of your classroom or school, you’re able to truly understand what’s happening in education around the world and make the best decisions for your students.

Making the most of the Leader standard While the ISTE Standards for Educators’ Learner standard focuses on developing a

global network, the Leader standard encourages educators to model for colleagues the identification, exploration, evaluation, curation and adoption of new digital resources and tools for learning.

If you’ve done any kind of search for classroom resources recently, you know there’s no shortage of educational information and products online. And that’s part of the problem. Evaluating learning materials can be overwhelming, time-consuming and frustrating. With a little organization and direction, however, you can find quality resources quickly and easily.

Here are a few resources to help you start locating and curating resources: Find Feedly. Full disclosure: I’m not an organized person. I was the student who had her desk dumped weekly and had to carefully open my locker so papers wouldn’t cascade out.

Technology has saved me, and Feedly is one of my favorite tools for organizing and

Evaluating learning materials can be overwhelming, time-consuming and frustrating. With a little organization and direction, however, you can find quality resources quickly and easily.

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STANDARDS SPOTLIGHT

Staying current with research and conducting action research in our classrooms empowers us to not only make the right decisions, but provides evidence to show why we made those decisions.

curating online content. With Feedly, you can add any blogs, online magazines or topics that you want to follow, creating a daily feed from all the sites you add.

You can categorize the sites and save your favorite posts for later, making it easy to stay up to date on educational trends. And everything stays in one place, ready for you to view when it’s convenient for you.

Leverage your network. Now that you’ve established a network online, this is probably your most valuable resource for finding quality information and tools.

Want to know what works for classroom management in a middle school classroom?

Ask the question on Voxer or in an edcamp session.

Need a resource for communicating with parents? Ask your Twitter friends what they use. My edupals have saved me many times, finding just the right answer to a question or the perfect resource for my classroom or to help a teacher.

Staying current with the learning sciences ISTE Educator Standard 1.c. encourages teachers to stay current with research that supports improved student learning outcomes, including findings from the learning

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sciences. It’s no secret that teachers are under scrutiny and constantly evaluated based on choices they make in the classroom. Staying current with research and conducting action research in our classrooms empowers us to not only make the right decisions, but provides evidence to show why we made those decisions.

Here are a few resources to stay up on the learning sciences: Go to Google Scholar. Google Scholar allows you to narrow your Google search results to journals and other scientific research, making it easier to find articles and educational studies. The searches often link to paid databases, so this is something to consider if you’re looking for free resources.

Get decision-making help with the NMC Horizon Report. The New Media

Consortium (NMC) publishes annual reports discussing current and future trends in education. Similar to Gartner’s Hype Cycles, the NMC Horizon Report offers important information to help educators make decisions about purchases and initiatives in their classrooms and schools. Currently, there’s a Horizon report for K-12 education, higher education, libraries and museums.

Visit the Office of Educational Technology’s website. The U.S. Depart-

ment of Education visits schools across the

STANDARDS SPOTLIGHT

country to determine what’s working and what isn’t. Its website, tech.ed.gov, contains a wealth of research and publications that will help you effectively improve learning with technology in your classroom.

Read a report on ESSA and the future.

The Center for Digital Education produced the “ESSA, Ed Tech, and the Future of Education” report in early 2017 about current practices and the future of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), blended learning, project-based learning and other educational topics.

By expanding your global network and curated resources, you’re better equipped to begin exploring the other ISTE Standards

for Educators. When you’re ready to tackle Standard 5, Designer, by designing differentiated authentic learning opportunities, or to further develop your skills in facilitating authentic tasks with Standard 6, Facilitator, the work will be easier if you reach beyond your classroom walls and remember that you don’t need to do it alone. kristin harrington is a digital support colle ague for fl agler count y public school s in florida. she’s on the pln le adership te am for the iste le arning spaces net work and is co -moder ator of the t wit ter chat #fledchat.

The work will be easier if you reach beyond your classroom walls and remeber that you don’t need to do it alone.

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MEMBER PROFILE Robert Joyce advocates for learning environments that let students follow their inspiration.

Robert Joyce This English teacher is helping students tell their own stories

By Nicole Krueger

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Are term papers dying out? Is the essay becoming obsolete? These questions plague English teachers everywhere as they deplore what video and social media have done to the art of rigorous writing.

But Robert Joyce isn’t one of them.

His students are as likely to write scripts as essays. They’re as familiar with green screens as with narrative structure. And they’re apt to present their research in an animated video rather than a term paper.

For the eighth grade teacher at Berner Middle School in Massapequa, New York, English class isn’t just about writing anymore.

“I’m not just interested in writing, but all expression,” says Joyce, winner of the 2017 ISTE Outstanding Teacher Award. “Stand-alone writing is going to become more and more rare as words are combined with visuals, audio and various forms of expression. I’m interested in helping students combine those skills into one package.”

Of course, Joyce isn’t your typical classroom teacher. He began his career at a startup daytrading firm where he learned how to use digital tools in a fast-paced environment to help wealthy clients trade their assets. He also did a lot of writing, which eventually led him back to school to get his master’s degree in education.

Returning to the classroom, this time as a teacher, he brought his collaborative startup mentality with him. He painted the entire back wall green and swapped the traditional rows of desks for a cluster of mini-studios where students collaborate on video projects on their 1:1 Chromebooks.

His goal was to create a learning environment that’s malleable enough to let kids follow wherever their inspiration might lead.

“All the concrete structures of learning need to be loosened up as much as possible so students aren’t limited at all by the learning environment itself,” he says. “I’m trying to figure out the right combination of tools and approaches to be able to tap into as much of their potential as possible by setting them free in terms of their ability to connect with the outside world.”

That sort of divergent thinking often got Joyce in trouble as a student in traditional classrooms where he felt penalized for going his own way.

As an educator, however, it makes him a leader among his peers who see him as a role model for technology integration. He collaborates with other teachers on digital projects, presents at conferences and proudly shares his students’ innovative work on Twitter.

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photos by s te v e smith

Robert Joyce says it's no longer just about stand-alone writing in English class, it's about all expression.

MEMBER PROFILE

“ I want to reward my students for being individuals.”

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“I want to reward my students for being individuals,” he says. “I want students to think differently and creatively and outside the box and be rewarded for it rather than penalized.”

Individual expression is so important to Joyce that he’s sometimes wary of showing students sample projects to help get them started.

“Students sometimes need me to show them an example to get across what I want them to do, but at the same time I almost regret it,” he says.

“The second I show an example, it inhibits their own creativity and shuts down other thoughts and ideas they may have had. I don’t want 100 copies of the exact same thing.”

By encouraging divergent thinking in his own classroom, Joyce enables students to pour themselves into their projects, eliciting a deeper level of engagement and commitment. Even when there’s no daily homework assignment, students often collaborate online after school, refining their work and propelling each other toward excellence.

“It’s much easier to get students on board when you’re giving them choices for how to do something. If it’s something that doesn’t connect

to them and they don’t have any choices about it, they’re not as fully invested as they would be if they could bring in their own personality, their own humor, their own background knowledge.”

When students demonstrate their learning through finished products, such as a videos or essays, what they’re really doing is expressing the stories they have in their minds, Joyce says. He strives to give them as many tools as he can.

“We have to figure out ways as educators to enable them to get those stories out. Everybody has a different way of expression. I think it’s very important to give students as many methods as possible to express themselves.

“That way, we enable them to be storytellers and to figure out how they can tell their own stories.” nicole krueger is a freel ance writer and former newspaper reporter. she writes about education technology and the tr ansformation of learning.

TAKE ACTION

photo by motophoto

Doug Casey wants the ISTE Standards in every classsroom.

Connecticut endorses ISTE Standards for Students, Educators Doug Casey Executive Director, Connecticut Commission for Educational Technology Board Member, Connecticut Educators Computer Association

The Connecticut Commission for Educational Technology, our state’s educational technology lead, unanimously adopted the ISTE Standards for Students last year and the ISTE Standards for Educators last June, becoming the first state to do so in both cases.

We see the ISTE Standards as masterful personas that define how students and teachers should use technology to support learning.

They strike just the right balance between descriptive and prescriptive, making them relevant for years to come, regardless of current technology trends.

Connecticut is “all in” on endorsing the standards, but that step remains relatively easy compared with the bigger challenge – ensuring their application in every Connecticut classroom.

Doing so starts with positioning the ISTE Standards as complementing and reinforcing existing frameworks and best practices.

They speak to many aspects of the Common Core, National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) and American Association of School Librarian (AASL) standards, for example, as crosswalk analyses have shown. And the successful adoption of proficiency-based, project-based and blended learning approaches – as many of our districts have done – depends on students and teachers mastering the creativity, collaboration and critical-thinking skills the ISTE Standards espouse.

So what’s our game plan for putting the standards into practice?

In Connecticut, we’re engaging key leaders and stakeholders – from the Connecticut State Department of Education and State Board of Education to our ISTE affiliate, superintendents, boards

of education and educators – to make the standards part of learning and teaching. This work represents a key part of our five-year state educational technology plan and will take place on a number of fronts: Teacher preparation. Work with teacher preparation standardbearers and institutions to integrate standards into preservice frameworks and programs.

Accreditation. Encourage district accreditation bodies to make the demonstration of ISTE Standards part of their assessment rubrics.

Standard set integration. Create crosswalks of the ISTE Standards with other sets already in practice. Better yet, “augment” these other standards with ISTE language and objectives to create unified guides that remain contextually relevant to educators and school leaders.

Advocacy. Through formal meetings and statewide presentations, raise awareness of the standards among groups that can champion them with their constituents, including superintendents, boards of education, teacher unions and parents.

Resource library. In tandem with our work around open education resources (OERs), develop a standards-aligned library of digital learning resources that also serves as a community of practice for educators.

Legislation. Encourage members of the Connecticut General Assembly to consider updating graduation requirements to reflect the higher-level thinking skills the standards define.

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TAKE ACTION

Educator rubric. Develop a self-assessment educators can use individually or in partnership with their supervisor. This instrument would help gauge their level of mastery in using technology for instruction and provide a clear pathway and supports for improvement.

District policy. Encourage districts and state associations to integrate the ISTE Standards into student and staff policies, resulting in, for example, acceptable use policies that point to best practices rather than penalties for misuse of technology.

None of these efforts – and no single organization, including our commission – can ensure successful adoption of the ISTE Student, Educator and (next year) Administrator Standards. Doing so will require enthusiasm, insight and hard work by the educational community over time. It’s a challenge we’re excited to accept.

Learn more about how to lend your voice to edtech policy at iste.org/advocacy.

“ Connecticut is ‘all in’ on endorsing the standards, but that step remains relatively easy compared with the bigger challenge – ensuring their application in every Connecticut classroom.”

Successful tech coaches

don’t fear change, they embrace it.

Learn how to effectively plan and lead digital transformation in your school with The Edtech Advocate’s Guide to Leading Change in Schools.

Order now at iste.org/ChangeSchools

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AD INDEX Statement of Ownership. Statement of Ownership, Management, and Circulation (Required by 39 U.S.C. 3685). 1. Title of Publication: Empowered Learner. 2. Publication No.: 2573-1807. 3. Filing date: August 15, 2017. 4. Issue Frequency: Quarterly. Number of Issues Published Annually: 4. 6. Annual Subscription Price: $49 for members, $100 for nonmembers. 7. Complete Mailing Address of Known Office of Publication (Not Printer): International Society for Technology in Education, 621 SW Morrison Street, Suite 800, Portland, OR 97205.

8. Complete Mailing Address of the Headquarters of General Business Offices of Publisher (Not Printer): for business name and address refer to #7. 9. Full Names and Complete Mailing Addresses of the Publisher, Editor, and Managing Editor: Publisher—ISTE, 1530 Wilson Blvd Suite 730, Arlington, VA 22209; Editor—Julie Phillips Randles, 524 Rye Court, Roseville, CA 95747; Managing Editor—Diana Fingal, Director of Editorial Content, 621 SW Morrison Street, Suite 800, Portland, OR 97205. 10. Owner: Refer to #7. 11. Known Bondholders, Mortgagees, and Other Security Holders Owning or Holding 1 Percent or More of Total Amount of Bonds, Mortgages, or Other Securities: None. 12. The purpose, function, and nonprofit status of this organization and the exempt status for federal income tax purposes has not changed during preceding 12 months. 13. Publication Name: Empowered Learner. 14.

Issue Date for Circulation Data Below: July 2017 (Volume 1 Number 1). 15. Extent and Nature of Circulation. Average No. Copies Each Issue During Preceding 12 Months. 15a. Total Number of Copies (net press run): 16,528. 15b. Paid Circulation. 15b1. Mailed Outside-County Paid Subscriptions Stated on PS Form 3541 (Include paid distribution above nominal rate, advertiser’s proof copies, and exchange copies): 14,136. 15b2. Mailed In-County Subscriptions Stated on PS Form 3541 (Include paid distribution above nominal rate, advertiser’s proof copies, and exchange copies): Zero. 15b3. Paid Distribution Outside the Mails Including Sales Through Dealers and Carriers, Street Vendors, Counter Sales, and Other Paid Distribution Outside USPS: 1,881.

15b4. Paid Distribution by Other Classes of Mail Through the USPS: 24. 15c. Total Paid Distribution [Sum of 15b]: 16,041. 15d. Free or Nominal Rate Distribution (By Mail and Outside the Mail) 15d1. Free or Nominal Rate Outside-County Copies included on PS Form 3541: 200. 15d2. Free or Nominal Rate In-County Copies included on PS Form 3541: Zero. 15d3. Free or Nominal Rate Copies Mailed at Other Classes Through the USPS: Zero. 15d4. Free or Nominal Rate Distribution Outside the Mail (Carriers or other means): 2. 15e. Total Free or Nominal Rate Distribution [Sum of 15d]: 202. 15f. Total Distribution (Sum of 15c and 15e): 16,243. 15g. Copies not Distributed: 285. 15h.

Total (Sum of 15f and 15g): 16,528. 15i. Percent Paid (15c divided by 15f times 100): 98.76%.Actual No. Copies of Single Issue Published Nearest to Filing Date. 15a. Total No. Copies (net press run): 16,255.

15b1. Mailed Outside-County Paid Subscriptions Stated on PS Form 3541 (Include paid distribution above nominal rate, advertiser’s proof copies, and exchange copies): 13,159. 15b2. Mailed In-County Subscriptions Stated on PS Form 3541 (Include paid distribution above nominal rate, advertiser’s proof copies, and exchange copies): Zero.

15b3. Paid Distribution Outside the Mails Including Sales Through Dealers and Carriers, Street Vendors, Counter Sales, and Other Paid Distribution Outside USPS: 2,584. 15b4. Paid Distribution by Other Classes of Mail Through the USPS: 29. 15c. Total Paid Distribution [Sum of 15b]:15,772. 15d. Free or Nominal Rate Distribution (By Mail and Outside the Mail) 15d1. Free or Nominal Rate Outside-County Copies included on PS Form 3541: 235. 15d2. Free or Nominal Rate In-County Copies included on PS Form 3541: Zero. 15d3. Free or Nominal Rate Copies Mailed at Other Classes Through the USPS: Zero.

15d4. Free or Nominal Rate Distribution Outside the Mail (Carriers or other means): 2. 15e. Total Free or Nominal Rate Distribution [Sum of 15d]: 237. 15f. Total Distribution (Sum of 15c and 15e):16,009.

15g. Copies not Distributed: 246. 15h. Total (Sum of 15f and 15g): 16,255. 15i. Percent Paid (15c divided by 15f times 100): 98.52%.17.

This Statement of Ownership will be printed in the October 2017 issue of this publication. 18. Name and Title of Editor, Publisher, Business Manager, or Owner: Tiffany Montes, Senior Director of Finance, International Society for Technology in Education. Date: August 15, 2017. I certify that all information furnished on this form is true and complete.

I understand that anyone who furnishes false or misleading information on this form or who omits material or information requested on the form may be subject to criminal sanctions (including fines and imprisonment) and/or civil sanctions (including civil penalties).

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COMMUNITY VOICES ISTE members share a few of their favorite things.

What is your favorite tool to address the Empowered Learner standard in the ISTE Standards for Students?

Surface Studio (bit.ly/2eqPsbA) The Surface Studio is the foundation for our school’s new foray into podcasting.

The Studio is in our makerspace and is open to any student in the building to actively articulate ideas and communicate those ideas globally. The Brebeuf Arrow student newspaper (print) now has a social media/web editor and a team of students podcasting and sharing their content via a newly refreshed website (brebeufarrow.com). In addition to podcasting news items, students are beginning to independently podcast for student choice assignments in their World Civ and Digital Citizenship courses.

Jen LaMaster, assistant principal and teacher/mentor publication news, Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School, Indianapolis, Indiana

Buncee (edu.buncee.com) Students have so many choices for being creative, sharing ideas and designing a very authentic and meaningful representation of what they have learned.

Buncee allows students to choose images, text, audio and more, which enhances student creativity and promotes student choice in learning.

Rachelle Dene Poth, foreign language and STEAM teacher, Riverview School District, Oakmont, Pennsylvania

Skitch (evernote.com/products/skitch) Skitch lets students label photos, diagrams and other graphics to illustrate important concepts and demonstrate their thinking. Students can use Skitch to add comments to a PDF, mark up a screenshot, annotate a photo or draw something new.

Annotation tools include arrows, stamps, text, shapes, pens and more.

This easy-to-use tool can be used across platforms.

Learning management systems When I think about tools that support students in becoming Empowered Learners, I immediately think of our learning management system (LMS). A versatile, flexible LMS can dramatically change the online experience for students in ways that allow them to organize their time and tasks, give and receive feedback, share learning and curate content. The true power of an LMS lies in the hands of the teacher. It can simply be a receptacle for content and worksheets, or it can be intentionally designed as a learning experience that builds the skills of an Empowered Learner.

Jamey Everet, technology integrator, Park Tudor School, Indianapolis, Indiana, and learning design coach, Global Online Academy

Anna Baralt, director of educational technology, Shorecrest Preparatory School, St. Petersburg, Florida

Flipgrid (flipgrid.com) Flipgrid is an interactive tool that educators can access online or with the app. A teacher sets up a grid and creates different topics for discussion. Students contribute to the discussion via video submission. It’s a simple concept that opens up a world of creative uses for learners to be empowered. Students can submit videos in French, ASL, Spanish or any language and can even use puppets instead of themselves. Teachers can set up a space for parents to leave encouraging video messages for their kids. This gives empowered students an opportunity to amplify their voice, practice and model positive digital citizenship, expand their digital literacy and have a whole lot of fun in the process!

Clara J. Alaniz, instructional technology specialist, Plano ISD in Plano, Texas

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THE EDTECH WORLD IS BIG. Start small, find your crew, share in big successes.

ISTE Professional Learning Networks (PLNs) are robust peer-to-peer sharing networks that empower ISTE members to connect with other members interested in similar topics.

“What ISTE PLNs bring to members is that sense of connection, that there are people out there facing the same problems you face on a daily basis. You connect to people who run into the same setbacks and share the same successes." —Larry Kahn, Chief Information Officer, Iolani School, Hawaii With ISTE PLNs you can: • Attend an ISTE Professional Learning Series webinar — 30 minutes to learn something new.

• Ask a question and get real-time support from community members.

• Network with other leading educators and develop long-lasting friendships.

Learn more at iste.org/community

Professional Learning Network

EMPOWERED LEARNER

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