Jeff U. http://www.thethinkingstick.com/ has got me to participate in a podcast this week with David C. http://lessonslearned.edublogs.org the question is How to shift when administrators are not on board? For me if the administrators are not on board, then engaging in a shift is going to be an upward battle, and unfortunately too often frustrating, and the impact of the shift dissipated. If you are going to make a shift in implementing, initiating, or developing a new IT pedagogy in an international school, I feel you have to start with the Administrators first. It is a non negotiable for making the shift “happen“, Why? School Administrators in International Schools are the decision makers, and the stakeholder group that has the ability to implement and generate clear accountability for implementation. They have the capacity to create systems, procedures, and process that will engage different stakeholder groups with the shift, and provide the financial, and institutional support for this to take place and become part of the culture of the school.
BUT what most often happens is that many IT initiatives start at a grass roots level, with a teacher or two piloting an idea, and then through a system of osmosis more people get interested. Then a needs develops where people feel they want this department wide or section wide. This is then most often pushed up to the Administration. This then competes with a whole load of other initiatives, and often is then pushed back, or gets lost in the shuffle. I believe that if you are going to start any IT initiative the first group to work with is your administration.
A case study: In my current school we wanted to start a laptop program, the first group we targeted was the Administration. We all got them laptops and made the school wireless. We had a 4 month period for them to start working with the laptops and wireless, and also developed an understanding that these laptops would be used at all Admin meetings and that each administrator would model the use of these within their respective section of the school in staff meetings. The process allowed each administrator to quickly appreciate the flexibility of the laptop for planning , collaboration, and giving them creative ways to share and present. This quickly become indispensable tools. The conversation now switched to how each of the administrators started seeing how this could benefit the teachers. So we got a group of volunteers from the teaching staff to pilot the use of the laptops plus a projector. This group of faculty quickly adopted these, and there was within a few weeks a marked difference was evident with the way they delivered the lessons and engaged the kids in a learning process. From there we then expanded this to include all faculty, and in tandem introduced wireless laptop carts. Within months the laptop cart had such a high demand, and with the teachers integrating these within their curriculum, saw a transition where technology tools became a critical resources in the learning process of the students. The demand outstripped the supply, this was a perfect time then to transition to a 1 to 1 model where we are today with our Middle School and now going to our High School.

So what happened? As the administrators were the ones who first hand dealt and used the new tools they developed an understanding within their culture of the potential impact on learning. They as a group quickly through experience and integrating the laptops in their own day, realized in a very concrete manner the potential for these in a classroom setting. Their understanding and buy-in framed the next steps of the process with a clear strategic decision to move forward. They as a stakeholder group came to understand the importance of the use of laptops, and were then able to support, facilitate and buy into setting up time, monies, and a procedure for this to be implemented school wide. In the process building both social and political capital with the faculty and IT Department. The conversations that occurred with the different groups became more meaningful.

If you are going to put an effort and time with an IT initiative the first stakeholder group to get on board not just with the idea, but actually have them “do it” “use it” “implement it” ! This process alone will expose them to issues, understandings, and experiences that will have them better equipped to move forward in any decision. They point for me, is the bumps, frustrations, and problems they will experience will give them clear talking points to include in the system, process and procedure they will adopt for further buy in by other stakeholder groups.

okay it is top down, but for a good reason 🙂

John @ISETS

It has been a crazy month, weeks, launched the 1 to 1 laptop in the Middle School, then followed up with the transition to letting the students take them home….. juggling the options and needs of a new Student Information System…. and making sure the process and procedure allows us to make a good choice, with a clear understanding that nothing is perfect and everything has a learning curve……

sprinkled in between this, was a trip to Beijing China. It had been 8 years, and the change, and face lift the city has had with the push of the Olympics was mind boggling… I did not recognize it. It was evident, that there is a shift in the world and the Chinese are the new big players. The days actually where spent doing an IT Audit for an International School there…the visit, conversations, observations, and collective discussions brought about a lot of points of reflection on my own role as an IT Director. It is always so much easier going into a school and looking from the outside inside, and then coming up with talking points, frameworks and observations for improvement, or enhancements. It is interesting how this whole area of having IT Audit done by other International School IT folks is still new. I think the exchange and collaboration bring a lot to both parties. I left after a busy busy three days, with greater clarity on my own goals, and direction, strategy and belief about the school I work in, and the people I collaborate with. In return I from the outside was able to restate, re-frame many understanding about the IT systems, process and procedures which where in place that need to be looked at, and enhanced AND that the staff and faculty themselves already had highlighted. As Jamie McKenzie always says ” there are no prophets in your own back yard.”

Next today I head out to Jakarta to help out with the http://www.learningdigital.org/ conference, which I will be facilitating workshops and co-presenting the Sunday Keynote….

it is often amazing how as an IT Director and part of a collaborative group of people in my school how often we get eaten up by the day, and almost are blinded by the day to day grudge of our responsibilities, variables and tasks, that there is little time to reflect, sit back, and get into the academic aspects of our work, and the impact and connections with the world outside. For me these trips are a unique opportunity to sit back, and connect and start remembering why I love this field and work… and how important that we understand we all are facilitators of an understanding of the Digital World out there around us. The pace, tempo and stress of International Schools tends to prevent us too often from reflecting and digging deeper into the meaning of our work, ideas, actions and plans. So as I head out, and get to spend a few days with other educators, and Jeff Utecht: http://www.thethinkingstick.com/ and David Elliot as co-faciliators of the keynotes…. my mind is ready for the academic juggle, exchange and sharing. This allowing again to frame my own day, and busyness with critical moments of refleciton on what this is all about…. Information Technology in International Schools.

John @ISTES

Presenting to a group of parents about an upcoming 1 to 1 Laptop Program we are about to launch this fall with our Middle school. On one mid week evening we had invited students to come and share their work they had produced in integration with various projects and tasks they had been involved with throughout the year. One piece of work was a very powerful multimedia piece incorporating movie, music, and keynote (Apples answer to PowerPoint with more mmmff). It was a short 5 minute piece of work which focused on child labor in India and the impact and injustice associated with this situation. This was done for a Social Studies project on Slavery. The combination of timing, music, content, images and the students really understanding the power of the different mediums, there relationship, and how to integrate each applications was extremely powerful. The effect on the audience was emotional and strong. To me it was a delightful confirmation that these students clearly understood their topic, and had the creative power to deliver it in a way that left an impact on the audience. More importantly it was evidence of their deep understanding of not only the applications but how to combine an intense topic and deliver it within a clear and consice medium that they interact and live with in their day to day lives. Standing up on the stage reading the similar topic and concept outload from an essay would have left us all indifferent. The students tapped into their comfort zone, that of multimedia using todays digital mediums which they are exposed to on a daily basis in multiple venues. Nice one!

John@ISTES

Growing up Online!
…there a bit of fuss, stress and at times surprise…..that is fine and hopefully the fuss dynamic will reconnect us, with conversations ….parents and kids. It is not about the digital generation and us, it is about how we might have all (parent, and kids) not taken the time to sit and listen, watch, participate without throwing in an opinion, remark and perspective from our lense only. I hear, they are always online, not connecting. Kids on MSN, Facebook, and others……so instead of always trying to control and dictate their time span through your parameters… why not walk over to the kids hanging on the screen and ask, watch and listen. Okay there also is the whole dynamic of trust…but will not go there……. I am fortunate and have had a great coach that framed the issue, about spending time together. ~So I had a lovely evening with my son, he showed me his Facebook, I showed mine, we spent and hour together, poking around, me listening, hearing, and then sharing …..

So maybe if you cannot hang face to face, get online, get a Facebook, chat etc…. and go to them have them mentor you, and in the moments when you are both sitting next to each other let yourself listen, hear, nothing more, let them share their world, let them bring you in….from there it is still the same, it is about hanging out together, spending time…. in maybe a new paradigm but the basics are the same… human interaction.

John@ISETS

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_A-ZVCjfWf8

NO the Sex Pistols are not part of the digital generation. The picture and the above youtube link to Vision of K-12 Students, are each a statement about an age, a time, a generation and an expression. I get to watch and observe quite a few classes, and see students in the context of their lesson, unit and/or course.

And still today, many of these kids, sit, listen, take notes, and passively (as best they can) take it in. But that is not what they want……why sit there at a desk, when around you is this whole world of interaction, social networking, collaboration, creation, opportunities to step in analyze, responded, and most importantly create.

I believe that the disconnect for some kids with the way information and learning is set up in the context of the classroom, motivates them to sign off.

Why? that would be a long story. I think for me, who was one of those kids not being able to sit through long endless monologues, and then in isolation have to deliver my memory of facts, the ability for passive intake is over for most of our students. They are surrounded with a world which begs for creativity, critical thinking, multitasking, and is actually saying send me people that can unlearn learn and relearn. These critical attributes are what I believe will give our kids the edge in a world where creativity and innovation have become a global commodity.

To be honest I think most teachers who still feel obliged to sit their students through endless monologues, with reams of vocabulary lists, quotes, definitions etc…are maybe involuntarily…. afraid, not sure or hesitant to open their teaching style to a collaborative interchange, where everyone creates some concrete learning hands on!

If you are surrounded by a world that begs to multi task, which becomes the norm for your own social interaction, is the measure by how you exist with your peers…..how one stays connected, informed and in tune… would you not expect this to be harnessed and integrated in the learning process for every child.

Somehow it isn’t in many schools. True there are so many variables, and constraints on facilitating a learning which enrages, engages and effects kids in a way which allows them to experience: analyze it, manipulate it and then use it in a kaleidescope of mediums, each time tweaking, and altering this knowledge to fit new variables.

I think sometimes where the real cutting edge learning is going on, is out of the classroom, at night in the afternoons, with Web 2.0 tools that our kids have embraced in a way that it is not an add on, but part of their fabric as humans eager to learn and grow.

John @ISTES

thought of safety, the concept of a zone where one has one’s own unique space, easy to kind of kick back, day dream, muse and ponder.

http://www.socialsafety.org/teens_cyberbullying.html http://www.socialsafety.org/teens_quick_tips.html
http://www.socialsafety.org/teens_tmi.html

guess what the journal tucked in your cabinet, under your bed, the whispers you share that do not leave the room, suddenly have gone for a paradigm shift,
………….. online for you, me , them, us, they and over there to read, react, hear, listen, talk, and somehow before you now it they, he, she, them, us are there in that zone, unique space and corner of the world where secrets where for only the chosen few.

bla bla bla, I will never be a poet, or a writer. But today I was caught in a series of interviews, meetings, heavy, with heart and kept the day on its toes…. then I walk the corridors bump a couple shoulders and a hello realizing the kids around me and privacy somehow has transcended to a new level or has the craze of Web 2.0, internet and technology fooled them into a false sense of safety…. how much is naivety, how much is innocence, and how much maybe is just a new understanding, reality and change.

I like the above three links, thanks to Karenthelibrarian who shared them… nothing amazing, but hit a chord with me and got me thinking.

John @ISETS

Saving, keeping, and storing your digital stuff (files, music, photos etc…) with so much generated on a day to day basis on our respective computers, often one gives off this false sense of stability. I would guess to say most people save their files, photos, music and videos on their computer and to them that is it, once saved there all is well. It must be something inherited from the non digital era when you had a file and you put it into a cupboard and their was a sense of permanency unless the place burned down. The unfortunate reality in my view is that pretty everything we generate on our computers unless printed is digital= a bunch of one and zeros…. ironically the importance of these files etc.. have only increased with our day to day lives.

So switch to an international school environment, where you then need to set up an infrastructure and systems to support users with a rich variety of needs for backing up and saving. This takes server space, time, set up and training. An important service and then again providing a layer of security for each user.

This is where the heresy might begin for some. When I came into my job as Director of IT one of the big issues was the whole backing up of faculty and student files. We had a somewhat unstable system, lots of problems with connections, and bad files, to large folders trying to be put up on the server etc….. their was a growing frustration by all parties involved. Instead of investing more money and/or time I decided with the team that we would move the responsibility of backing up to the user. To support them we provided them with 250MB of virtual hard drive space on our Moodle environment, and then through training and regular notices as shared above had them become responsible for backing up their own files and folders. Flash sticks and CD’s were made available and also we encourage people to buy their own. Our IT Specialist would also spend time training and supporting faculty through the process.

I think this move and philosophy of moving more responsibility onto the user is something I feel is important to facilitate in the context of a international school. I have replicated this same philosophy with the students and they seem quite comfortable.

The role I feel IT departments in international schools should be to provide the learning portal (internet, pedagogy, support, mentoring and facilitation) to the users, and at the same time through a system where each user is responsible for their own files, folder, photos and music back ups. The way technology is today, and the inexpensive access to a variety of different backing up systems both online and offline, schools need not get bogged down with this.

The process in itself provides a talking point and modeling for each user in my opinion……..

John @ISETS

We talk, we pontificate, we try to understand there are the great youtube moments about the shift and then the student voices……………

BUT this picture that I keep close to me as a reminder that yes the world is moving at ridiculous speeds, Google this, Facebook that……….but what about over half the world………. I am not sure in all our excitement and amazement and daily wonderment how it is all changing so fast, are we thinking of the implications of the REAL DIGITAL divide…..

maybe we should all have this picture not only on our office desk but in our minds… a first step what next then?

John @ISTES

….. it will be two years this June since (again) I have been working, managing, facilitating and developing an Information Technology Program as an IT Director here in Prague….in many ways in tandem with this journey has been the re-acquaintance with the Apple platform after a 5 year hiatus, last time I was in a similar position and working with the Apple platform was in China. So why a blog entry for this…..I am an avid reader of the Economist, and ironically last Friday after spending an afternoon with Apple CZ General Manager over lunch, discussing various ways to move forward with their support of our program, starting a 1 to 1 Laptop project at my school, I got back to school and in my mailbox was the issue….after reading the leader and supporting articles, it got me to reflect on my own personal experience with Apple, the platform, the machines, the concept and innovation associated with the company… and hard to describe the kind of wooaa factor that seems always to come into play in the press, and with users I support and work with.

In a school, any school which engages in having a information technology program, the machines, hardware, and peripherals you decide to work with can quickly come to play a critical role in you moving forward in support the systems, process, pedagogy and innovation for the school. International Schools often have the odd challenge of being located in areas of the world where your hardware choices are dictated by market forces, the basic fact that one brand, or type of machinery is only available to you. So you make do with what you have and move from there…. I feel today with the globalization of markets, this is less the case and in tandem some excellent local products being available the choices are greater.

So back to Apples….I left China and managing an IT program with Apple products at the end of the pre-OSX era 99-2000, and did not find working with Apples and maintaining the machines, and often the frustration of trying to collaborate with Microsoft servers a pleasant experience. Lots of bugs, issues and limitations. I personally felt the cult of Apple was not enough to keep the platform so much in the limelight….there also was the terrible after sales service and often frustrating pricing which we had to deal with. I often got the feeling Apple really could care less about the school market outside of the US, and even though we had a few people from Apple swing buy with promises little ever materialized. The feeling I developed was if you work with Apples you kind of are on your own.

Moving to Tokyo and then walking into the world of Dell and IBM, seemed almost refreshing, okay the machines are not sexy, there is not the cache of Apple look, but the service side ,and great prices supported by three year warranties, and in Japan a 24 turnaround time, made managing over 1000 machines that much easier for all of us involved. There is no doubt in my time there, the almost mandatory process of having to re-install drivers on a regular basis, being completely shut down for three days due to virus attack, and at times the temperamental nature of the Windows OS and the applications living on it, provided hectic days.

Prague, and back to the Apple platform, and to be honest at first with my own memories of the difficulties of the days before OSX…..OSX and the new life Apple seemed to have put ( thanks Steve J) into everything it touched. No doubt the ipod was and is the catalyst to this transformation but also in parallel the new laptops and desktop seemed to have the consumer in mind, with the thought, let us make it easy, smooth, and simple simple…..fun, and give us all a feel we can make a cool movie or sound track with a drag and drop philosophy…..which is a perfect fit for any school. I could go on, and not sure I need to…. all I know we have over 459 machines, one full time technician ( hats off and credit goes all to JS) and one network manager, and the over 200 laptops (ibooks and Macbooks) and daily the stability, reliability, and ease to manage issues is great…remote desktop is a huge help, also lots of front loading with our users both teachers and student: expectations for use, a somewhat locked down desktop and laptop…sorry users… and a big belief that as an institution we provide the learning portal…( ie internet, hardware…) storage back up etc… is the users responsibility.

for me always…..if you expect people to learn, move to the other side of the paradigm shift that of information technology integration…the tools need to work seamlessly, easily and be intuitive.
Apple seems to do the trick…but then again is it not the case that many of the Web 2.0 interfaces and many of the cellphones etc… it is now about the consumer and in many ways making sure the lowest common denominator can use these tools, feel empowered and free to be part of the digital landscape.

John @ISTES

The dissemination of IT PD and IT integration and best practice ideas should be based on “Demand” or “Need” rather than merely “Supply” of what’s available.

Demand or Need Driven IT Integration:
How can IT serve your most pressing needs in your classroom?
What do you want to accomplish in your classroom? …in this lesson or unit?
…only later. Let’s see how IT can help you reach those goals.

Supply Driven IT Integration:
Ideas and information is pushed out to people and mostly received as “noise.”

Having heard Robert over a skype conversation and then three of my colleagues hear him sharing his views again at the ECISIT conference in Düsseldorf has had us all thinking and realizing the importance of maybe re-evaluating our approach to information technology integration.

There is no doubt as an IT Specialists that for us we want people to move in certain directions embracing the power of IT pedagogy and tools, us working with these daily quickly understand and value how these can enhance the student’s learning experience. To be honest so do most people if you sit them down and give them time to reflect and talk BUT……

the reality is that teachers in an international school setting ( I am not as comfortable making statements about public schools as I do not work in one) are pulled in a million directions, with many different demands placed on them throughout the day, while in tandem they work in educating their students. It is somewhat a competition to get their focus and attention, as they get bombarded with all these tasks, each more pressing than the other, many often disconnected from the specific task to teaching children….. the side effect, is that after a while it all comes in as noise. There is a whole conversation and blog around this, which I will not go into.

Robert’s quote strength is that if we are competing with noise, why bother. Thus the powerful strategy of focusing our attention and support as IT Specialist on areas teachers need help, and this not decided by us, but generate by the teacher themselves. A process where IT Specialists/Tech Departments, engage in a conversation, dialogs with the focus of being the listener, and taking stock of the issues, needs and problems, and from there then in tandem with the teachers buy-in generating specific solutions and goals to support them , with their specific needs. To be blunt we are competing with all other agenda found in a school, and often IT comes as an add on, or something being pushed down the teachers street… I agree with Robert let us stop pushing, let us listen, hear them out, understand, empathize, and then in collaboration with the clear understanding of what they need, support them.

Thanks Robert….maybe many of us feel we have been doing this, or others feel it is the IT Department and Specialist who should be calling the shots… I disagree, why be noise when you can potentially be part of a constructive collaborative model with the teachers needs as the driving force of your support and facilitation.

John @isets.org