OLLIE Iowa

This sets apart a quality online learning situation, rather than a work at your own pace, or checklist class, in which authentic learning probably isn't happening.

High Quality learning resources means that a video that was 'great' 2 years ago, might be dated now. I can see making sure that we continuously update our content in the online classes is a serious undertaking each year. We can't show the same VCR tape as we did in 1987 anymore :-)

As many teachers do not have significant training in curriculum development, I wonder how much of an issue this may be. Will more standardized online curriculum be developed for K-12 teachers and learners?

This is sometimes a challenge because while we want to be flexible, we also want the course to be interactive. If groups of students are working on vastly different timelines, it can create confusion and frustration for all.

At this point in the article, I have many thoughts floating around. One major thought comes to mind. Can we ever fully personalize our classrooms? I get the points given here, but as a functioning society don't we have to conform a little bit? As parents, I think we do this to our children more than most of us would like to admit and certainly our schools follow suit. Also this first line here, isn't this what state standards do? Provide some sort of standardized leaning? Or is it simply saying that kids should be able to design how they will progress through a certain standard? A student chooses his or her own path to the end. However, if is a standard of no interest to me and you make me do it anyway is that truly personal learning? I'm starting to feel like flip flopping politician.

This seems to go against our current reality in my school. We're told that everything has to be data driven or evidence based. On the surface that makes sense, but my issue has always been that we are dealing with people not things. We work in a system filled with a multitude of variables and I would agree that there is a folly in believing that everything can be reduced to numbers. The more I read this article, the more I am thinking that we might be looking at turning the traditional school upside down on it's head.

Yes, our kids today are walking around with infinite knowledge at their finger tips. Yes, they don't know how to use it and when they are provided the opportunity, they don't seem to use it. I'm not saying that they can't or won't. I'm saying that from my experiences, they are trained not to do so. So many students do not realize their own potential for learning. They want to wait for the teacher to tell them what to do, what the correct answer is, or how to go about a particular task. Maybe we trained them too well. I 500% agree that we need to teach this skill. I also know that I have struggled to do this myself. If asked, I would have say, no I don't how to teach these new literacy skills. It's talked about, but I haven't seen any real professional development on the subject. If you know of any, please share.

I couldn't agree more with your ideas about students not knowing how to use the knowledge. Sometimes they ask me the simplest question and are offended that I don't have the answer for them. To which I ask, how could you find the answer? I feel as though they only take advantage of having that knowledge at their fingertips when it's a direct benefit to them and seems simpler than relying on someone else for the information. I encourage so many of my students to think through investigations for themselves and to try and come up with possible answers first. So many of them want to sit and wait for me to tell them everything and haven't realized how much more power there is in learning it if they put in the cognitive effort first. Coming from the same district, I also don't know how we teach them how to persevere through that when they just want to take the easy route, but there have to be some strategies out there that help to break down that "instant gratification mindset."

This seems like a tool that would be effective for all of my students. Most of them still take notes in their science notebooks--but a few have dabbled in writing their notes digitally. The problem I see with this is that they write them in separate google documents and then do not find a way to organize them so that they can access them easily when needed. This could be a good tool for them to learn early in their high school career and then carry it on as they get into courses with a larger need for note-taking.

This is definitely something that I would worry about with my students initially. Because they are used to having technology, I sometimes take for granted the skills I expect them to have when it comes to using different sites. Moodle has been a bigger learning curve for my students than expected, so I know that I would definitely need to prepare my students for setting up and using PLE first. Which also means that I need to feel comfortable explaining what it is and how it works to my students as well.

I find this becoming more and more true the longer I teach. My frustration comes from where to start in supporting students so that they can become more sophisticated in learning online. For example, I use Moodle for my courses rather than Google Classroom and I run into more hesitation and complaints from students than I anticipated because it is "something different." I'm not sure if it is because only a small subset of teachers are currently pushing their students outside of their comfort zones when it comes to online learning and that's where the pushback is, but I feel like we need more teachers to buy into changing the landscape of online learning beyond Google Classroom. I feel like only then will students start to develop those skills and abilities to grow in their capacity as online learners.

Sorry, I could resist this sentence. It's okay with me if it doesn't count towards my post, but I have to admit to laughing when I read this one. I'm not sure that most students get this today, I mean I hope they do, but the conversations I've had the past few years when students search things are scary.

I think this is the most eye opening factor within adaptive learning. It helps provide equity that is often missing when it comes to education. We know, that for the most part, our low social economic students preform lower than their counterparts. Which makes sense if you need tutoring and can't afford it. Adaptive learning technology has the potential to help schools bridge those gaps. It can help provide an equal opportunity for all. The point of, adaptive technologies acting like tutors, hadn't occurred to me before. As someone who needed tutoring in math as a young student, but came from a home where that wasn't feasible, I can appreciate the usefulness of adaptive technology.

Thinking about this first part and segments from the previous article, I would say that this idea would be a life saver. Sure, I realize that some students need more support than others, and sure I realize ways to give them the support they need, but how do I go about accomplishing such a daunting task? I often feel like that, at times, I'm running around with my head cut off. I can support student A who is struggling with seeing the connection from last weeks lessons to our current ones, but student B is so advanced that he's bored and tired of waiting so he's acting up instead, student C hasn't been to school in 8 days and has no idea where were at, and the list just goes on from there. I try to manage what I can by breaking students into groups, focusing on the larger picture, but I still realize that at many times, I'm falling short. If it can help assist me in meeting the needs of individual students, then I'm all for it. Later in the article it also talks about how it helps limit students from giving up. I think we can all agree, that's a huge bonus. My only unanswered questions are when to use it, how often, and at what point in the learning process? I've never used adaptive learning before, so I have lots to learn.

This sounds very hard. I wish there were some examples of taking a typical teacher centered lesson and changing it up to include all these features.

This seems very difficult to me. I wish there were some exmples of taking a teacher centered lesson and personalizing it as is explained here.

This sticky note is suppose to be on the first article. Don't know why it shows up here! I can't seem to delete it! Sorry.

Wow. This is a great example of learning with student choice that has incredible value but this risk is real and a reason that many schools would likely shy away from this type of encouragement.

As a parent, community member, and educator, I love this type of authentic learning. But how does this fit into the standards, required curriculum, high-stakes testing education system we have today? Do these partnerships with the community bring more support to schools or do they open up schools to even more criticism if test results aren't a piece of the puzzle?

True of the system or district as well...