My Learning Manifesto

As I continue to develop my ePortfolio, I really want to take advantage of my loquacious nature. As my wife will tell you, I am a talker. So I really think I should take advantage of podcasting. I would love to have an educational podcast mixed with a bit of humor. In today's culture we tend to get our entertainment a la carte. So perhaps this could be an effective means to stay in touch with my students, parents, colleagues and just the public at large. (Link to Podcasts)

But beyond myself, this might also be a cool concept for my students. As we dive deeper into the COVA model I realize that providing multiple outlets for students to show me how they learn is the epitome of UDL. If a student does not want to present live in class, but is willing to use Flipgrid or Anchor.FM and do some vlogging or podcasts that might be a great alternative choice while still maintaining authenticity. However, I still believe speaking in public is a valuable skill and ought to not be avoided. So I often walk a line with giving too much choice.

I also think that it is going to be a tough balancing act for teachers to really adopt a true UDL and COVA approach, because it is so outside the box. I recently watched Giovanni Corazza's Creative Thinking TEDx talk (2014) where he mentions that thinking outside the box feels unsafe and too new. We often feel like we are risking our dignity and reputation by discussing new and innovative ideas. This happens often in education wher teachers struggle to get away from the teacher dominant wall and factory style environment much like what Godin discussed in his Stealing Dreams TED Youth talk (2012). But as Corazza notes, we need to invest in "long thinking" and just because an idea is new does not mean we should disregard it. It just means it is harder to assess at first.

So I hope that as I continue in my educational leadership role that I keep long thinking at the forefront and really start working on items such as lesson study where we can have deep collegial dialogues about how to best facilitate our students in a variety of innovative lessons by giving Choice, Ownership and Voice in Authentic learning environments. It will take a while to become as ubiquitous as chalkboards, but I recently read a story that talked about how people were as up in arms about the Chalkboard years ago as they are about Chromebooks and other tech tools in the classroom. So I will continue to make new boxes to go outside of, because as John Dewey said in Schools of Tomorrow (1915), 'If we teacher today's students like yesterday's then we rob them of tomorrow.' And our students deserve better. I know for one that I can always be a better version of myself. Just like Tiger Woods hones his golf swing each and ever day so must we hone our craft of reaching every student in the classroom, every day!

My Learning Manifesto