An Opportunity to Support Leaders Interested in Realizing the Promise of the 21st Century School

Innovative educators will often share that one of the best ways to discover and implement innovative practices is by learning from others who are doing this work. Hearing about and seeing promising practices from those who are engaged in them is powerful. I encourage school leaders interested in hearing from others who are on the path to Realizing the Promise of the 21st Century School to attend Teaching Matters annual school leader forum: A Roadmap for Innovation which takes place Wednesday, July 15, 2009 from 2:00 pm - 4:00 pm at 475 Riverside Drive.

At the forum they’ll be asking, What is a 21st century school? For the most part technology is radically changing every sector of our society, yet schools remain largely unchanged. However, there are schools that are breaking the mold and engaging in innovative practices to engage learners and prepare them for the world in which they live. The forum will provide participants with the opportunity to hear from a panel of innovative NYC school leaders on the vanguard of rethinking urban education. They will speak about their experiences regarding what is important, the challenges and what's possible! Featured guests include:
• Alisa Berger: Principal, NYC iSchool
• Sarah Scrogin: Principal, East Bronx Academy for the Future
• Gregg Korrol: Principal, PS 101
• Julian Cohen: Director, New School Development

Teaching Matters will also provide a new and simple assessment tool for gauging where your school lies on a continuum of the 21st century school outcomes. It will help you evaluate your school's readiness and offer a roadmap of ideas for innovation in those areas you deem most critical.

This event is free to school leaders who can attend by rsvping to lmorris@teachingmatters.org or calling 2128703505. Wine and cheese will be served and all principals who attend will be eligible to enter a raffle to jump-start a 21st century classroom with: 15 FREE Flip Video Cameras or 5 FREE Netbooks.

To get an idea of what happens at these 21st century schools, check out the students at PS 5 in the Port Morris section of the Bronx and their amazing documentary about the history and impact of Nicholas Negroponte’s ground breaking XO pilot project in their school.


XO Project Documentary - Class 501 - Port Morris School
by jelbin

You can read about some innovative schools I’ve had the pleasure of visiting below.
X's & O's for the OLPC XO - A View from the Classroom
Immunization for an Uninteresting Curriculum Found at the iSchool
The Power of 21st Century Teaching and Learning Brought to Life at Bronx Middle School CIS 339’s Open House
You Can Get a Dalton Education at a NYC Public School
Bridging The Digital Divide in NYC, Science Leadership Academy – Lessons Learned

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Low-Price Laptops Tested at City Schools

I was just interviewed by The New York Sun along with my friend and colleague Lynette Guastaferro (Teaching Matters, Executive Director) and Bruce Lai (CIO-Chief of Staff) about Low-Price Laptops Tested at City Schools - September 30, 2008 - The New York Sun. The article tells of the upcoming availability of low-cost laptops (under $500) across NYC schools and in particular mentions two schools that are piloting Nicholas Negroponte's XO laptops at P.S. 5 in the Bronx and P.S. 20 in Brooklyn.

I had the pleasure of visiting P.S. 5 this week and met with the school's principal, Ms. Padilla and Literacy coach Ms. Leuzzi. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens at this school as they roll out this program in November with a focus on using the laptops to accelerate literacy achievement and engagement. As I shared in The New York Sun article, as a former literacy coach, I had the opportunity to work rather closely with Lucy Calkins at Teachers College, Columbia University who when I told her of my desire for every student to have a laptop asked why we should spend $1200 on laptops for kids. She asked, "Wouldn't that money be better spent toward purchasing books for every student??? As I explained to P.S. 5's literacy coach, the answer is a resounding, "No!" Providing each kid with a laptop not only connects them to endless information, countless resources, experts around the world and more, but it also instantly puts hundreds of thousands of books and texts in the palms of student's hands. When I told P.S. 5 Literacy coach about this conversation she asked, "How?" I explained and sent her the following resources which are posted at The Innovative Educator wiki.

Free Online Book Resources

• Digital Book Index
  Digital Book Index provides links to more than 141,000 full-text digital books from more than 1800 commercial and non-commercial publishers, universities, and various private sites. More than 100,000 of these books, texts, and documents are available free, while many others are available at very modest cost.
• LibroVox
  Objective is to make all books in the public domain available, for free, in audio format on the internet.
• Project Gutenberg
  Project Gutenberg is the first and largest single collection of free electronic books, or eBooks. Books are available in multiple languages.
• KidsClick!
  A website that provides resources for students by reading level.
  

Thanks to The New York Sun for sharing with readers an exciting possibility that has potential to positively shape the future of education where all students will have access to tools that will help them succeed inside and outside of schools.

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Visit City Public Schools Receive New Laptops for NY 1's coverage of the story.
Note the outdated video footage. It looks like it was taken at a school I worked at about 10 years ago in Harlem. You'll notice those are definitely not the kid-friendly XOs.

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Finally, A True Reading, Writing, Publishing Machine - XO 2010

Unlike some other laptops, you certainly could not accuse the new OLPC XO of being a business device thrown into a school. With its new open book design comprised of two touch-enabled screens that can transform into a keyboard when placed on its side, this is a true reading/writing/publishing machine. Placed face open not only does the XO offer two usable screens, but it also becomes a device where two people can work collaboratively-one on each screen.

When I saw the new XO and read the reviews I reflected on a conversation I had years back with Teachers College Reading and Writing Project Director Lucy Calkins as I attempted to convince her of the importance of laptops in the classroom. She said, "Why on earth would I buy laptops for each student? If I was going to spend $1500 per child, I'd rather purchase a library of books for each of them." I retorted saying a laptop is like providing every student with a vast library of books. I think I may have moved her thinking a bit, but while she agreed she could see how laptops could be a valuable coaching tool for her staff (topic for another post), there was still a leap to be made in convincing her of their usefulness as a student learning tool.

Like many literacy experts Lucy thinks of paper bound books when she thinks of reading, and paper notebooks when thinking of writing. At the same time numerous studies indicate that today’s digital native students, when given the choice, spend a great deal more time using computers to read and write than they do using traditional paper books and notebooks. The new XO laptop appears to be uniquely designed to bridge this gap between paper-trained adults and today’s millennial students by offering a device that looks and feels like it is designed for digital native reading, writing and publishing in a way digital immigrants can appreciate. It’s finally a device that brings to life the concept that this really is a tool positioned to bring an infinite amount of books and other reading materials right into the hands of students. In his, "Can the $100 Laptop Change the World?" interview with Laptop magazine, OLPC's Nicholas Negroponte shares that with this device, suddenly, a child has access to millions of books. Even more important, children can collaborate, can make things and can learn by doing.” As a former literacy coach and library media specialist I can tell you the countless hours I spent helping teachers acquire classroom libraries for general reading, for reading in the content areas, for reading by interest, etc. We would write grants, go to book fairs, beg, steal, borrow, type books in word processors, etc. etc. This was a lot of work and at the end we still struggled to have enough books to meet the needs of a class. It was a turn off for many in moving away from easy to acquire basal reading programs.

To date digital reading and writing is often neglected in literacy education, but it is where the Millennial generation chooses to spend the majority of its reading and writing time. A recent survey conducted by the Pew Internet and American Life Project revealed that student Bloggers, in addition to doing more types of writing and writing more frequently, are also among the strongest proponents of the importance of writing. This is correlated to another finding from the report stating that writing for an authentic audience motivates students to write and write well.

Since we know that many students use various technologies to communicate, a shift in the mediums we use with kids to communicate in education should follow. While I’ve already seen how XO’s can make a positive difference in the classroom, the new design appears to be even better situated to help make that shift by offering a tool that looks and feels like it’s been designed to harness the educational power of the device. What's great about the XO is it really simulates the look and experience of a book, but with a whole lot more functionality such as speaking text, instantly defining unknown words, translating text, highlighting, voice commenting, interactivity, dictionary, encyclopedia, video, and so much more.

With the new design and a targeted $75 targeted price point for 2010, the XO is sure to get hugs and kisses from even the most skeptical. This is a device that will literally push the transformation of education because with these specs and price point even the most reluctant will have to think twice. The future is now and the world of education needs to step up and start teaching to it. Now it looks like there's a device that will be a great partner in helping to make this happen. As the educational technology professional development manager for the largest school district in the U.S. you better believe that the new XO along with other low-cost laptops will transform how I work with our vendors and partners. If it is not on their radar to test out how their product or service can be implemented in schools using sub laptops, conversations will cease until they agree to explore this option. It is the responsibility of people like me to push and drive our digital immigrant educational partners to start working and thinking in 21^st Century ways that will appeal to our students. Even if these partners are not comfortable doing so…our students deserve it!

More Information

First Look: OLPC XO-2 - May 2008 review from Laptop magazine featuring pictures and video.

Watch Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the MIT Media Laboratory, describe how the One Laptop Per Child project will build and distribute the "$100 laptop.

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