This wasn't planned.

In fact, I'm still not convinced it's an amazing idea.

But this week, I handed gave the reins to my 6th period class....for content, instruction and assessment.

I realise that I may be completely insane.

It started with some collaborative brainstorming on topics, questions, methods, and texts they wanted to study.  Then each student chose a group and topic and started planning their own content to teach their peers.

I didn't even constrain it to humourous topics. But they are so invested in the course themes that the topics they chose were nearly all comedic; they ranged from writing original comedy, stand-comedy techniques, political satire, musical comedy, and improvisation workshops.  Half the class will be producing comedy films and then having the class analyse it closely.

Here were the requirements:
1. Choose a topic/question to cover and choose a group
2. Research and/or create the content/text to be shared
3. Prepare to lead a class discussion (in any format that we've used or practiced)
4. Give students a writing assignment of some kind (in any format)
5. Assess learning
6. Reflect on the effectiveness of their lesson

These units start next Friday.  I can't call them presentations.  A presentation means a bad powerpoint, nervous students, lack of engagement.  These already have a hell of a lot of passion behind them. 

Today I couldn't get the computer lab, so I just said:

This class period is yours.  If you need something from me, I'll be here.  But you guys are in charge.

I expected an argument, or at least a wasted period.  But here's what happened:
They all looked at each other, silently. Then,
Cipriana: Let's watch Workaholics!  It's an hour before Thanksgiving break.
Alexander: No, that's not the best use of our time right now. We need group time to work some stuff out.
Pierre: Wait guys, can we go around and say what we're going to be covering so there's no repeats?  Okay, Chelsea, what are you guys doing, and who is in your group?

They then went around - while the rest of the room was silent - and talked about their concept.  After every group gave their idea, other students expressed how excited they were for the ideas. There was not one group that didn't get a "wow, that sounds cool!" at some point.  The two groups that were a little similar had a quick negotiation to figure out how close their proposals were.  Then they checked in with me about it.

There was one undecided group - they came up and talked to me about their ideas, and with VERY little prompting from me, they came up with a great (slightly scary) question: When it comes to humour about race, where is the line, and why is that the line?  

We talked about how to frame it so it would make the best possible discussion.  And they left really excited.

**

I gave them the keys to the car, then I got in the backseat.  And instead of crashing into a pole, they immediately navigated hairpin turns with dexterity.

I do think they'll run into issues at some point, and will struggle to present their lesson effectively.  But they'll figure it out.  All of us need to make mistakes to learn how to be better.

**

And here's the meta part...or maybe just the uncomfortable part of all of this. 

This week has been overshadowed by a friend of mine being attacked for something she wrote on her blog.  In an entry devoted to asking for help to deal with a frustrating issue common to all of us who teach in a public school - unmotivated students - she was attacked with more logical fallacies than the cable news networks had during the election coverage.

The issue?  Her statement that her students don't know how to learn math.

They don't.  And I think the person most capable of making that judgement - their math teacher - is the one who should make that assessment.  Not some strangers on the internet.

Students DO, however, know how to learn in general, but learning academically and learning in general are different.  We are always learning.  But not everything we try to teach our students is something to which they will connect and in which they are interested.

There are lots of things that I didn't find interesting, but that I'm glad someone pushed me to learn at some point.  Here are a few of those things:

• How to solve for variables in Algebra
• Techniques for creating different effects in painting 
• French vocabulary
• Word derivations/roots/etymology
• Names and locations of every country (and its capital) in the world
• Hundreds of Bible verses 
• Medieval literature and how to analyse the sources that compose a text
• How to actively listen
• How to take notes and make note cards for an essay/presentation

And you know what?  I still know how to do those things.  Even though I wasn't passionate about any of them, because I had the academic ability to learn, I had the skills needed to transfer that knowledge into my memory.

I also have a freakish ability to find something interesting in ANYTHING I study.  My friends in college were absolutely shocked when I gave them the advice I used: Find an angle that is interesting and use that for your essay topics.  They looked at me like I was smoking crack.

That's when I realised that what I do naturally is not what everyone does naturally.

Learning is innate.  But academic learning?  That's acquired.  Some of us are lucky to have acquired it young.  I did.  And I am the exception, not the rule.

We don't go to school to learn how to love playing or eating or sleeping.  Those are things we all can find passion for or joy in.  We go to school to learn how to learn things we wouldn't normally choose to learn.

And we do that because there are some things that are valuable enough to ask everyone to learn them.  That's why the Common Core Standards movement is so important - it cannonises the knowledge we as a culture think is essential for all students to learn.

So what happens when the school system is broken?

You get students who are in 10th grade and have acquired the ability to learn in an academic context.  Students who may master video games, but struggle to write a coherent sentence.  And some people would say use the video game to teach sentence structure, or just don't teach the sentence structure and hope they'll just "get it" over time.

But is that really serving my students well to not teach sentence structure - at least holistically?  Is it a good use of my face-to-face time with my students to use video games to teach sentence structure?  Why would I spend time having them learn something with me that they could do on their own?  Why would I not give them individualised instruction that meets them where they are and them pushes them forward?  And I think that doing that kind of instruction well - where you infuse passion into subjects that aren't natural pairings - is time-consuming and rarely effective.  It just ends up being a little condescending to try and squeeze the names of Pokemon characters into paragraphs that have students practice sentence revision.

I also come from a pretty unique background.  I was homeschooled for 7 years, spanning the late 80's and early 90's, which was the Unit Study era in homeschooling.  We did one on the Pilgrims.  I remember planting a garden, making corn cakes, and creating a replica of the Mayflower.  

And that's it.  I didn't take out of that unit any more knowledge about gardening, cooking, or history than I brought into it.  And I fell years behind in math because math "never fit" with the unit studies, and I wasn't motivated to learn it on my own.  That is one of my biggest regrets.  

Am I saying that it's impossible to do that kind of curriculum well?

Obviously not.  The project my students have started would indicate otherwise.  I believe that student-driven content can be very powerful.

But there are reasons that my project will be successful.  And a lot of it has to do with what we've already learned (not all of which they found interesting), and a lot has to do with what they brought into the course from previous learning.  

This will be successful because my students:

• can research information and find reliable sources
• synthesise and analyse information with depth and clarity
• use technology to compile, organise and present information effectively
• have academic conversations that they run without my help
• can stay on task and focused on the end product

And most importantly, they:

• KNOW HOW TO LEARN

Now, because I have kids at the top of their educational game who are highly skilled and motivated, this wouldn't work with every class.  And it wouldn't even work in some of my other classes.  They don't have the skills they need.  And some of them don't want to build those skills.  They want the grade.  They want to just "get it over with" so they can move on.

So it makes me uncomfortable to, on one hand, turn over a class to a group of students capable of making it a success, and also to acknowledge that they are pretty unique.  For the past eight years, I've worked in schools where this never would have worked.  And yes, I tried.  And it's always been a massive failure.

This is what I think:

Passion + low skills = low effort and/or low quality

Passion + low skills + motivation = variable results (see: Freedom Writers Effect)

Passion + skill + motivation = high effort and high quality

The harsh reality of the state of public education is that not all students come to us prepared or motivated.  Can we help those students?  Absolutely.  That is what my friend wanted: help figuring out how.  And instead of help, she was bullied, harassed, and attacked.  So she is taking her passion and skill and hiding it so she can avoid being attacked further.

One of the meta-lessons of this issue is that passion doesn't make up for a total deficit of skill.  The people attacking her have no lack of passion.  But they also don't seem to understand how to have a respectful dialogue, nor engage in a discussion of the issues and avoid going after her personally.

I sincerely hope that, eventually, everyone will be taught the skills they need to be able to pursue their passion.  And I hope that eventually, every person could be like the students in my 6th period: skilled, motivated, self-directed, responsible, and extremely passionate.

If the world was filled with people like that, it would be a pretty amazing place to live.  It's certainly a pretty amazing place to learn.

Here's what they don't tell you when you're flipping in a highly-student centred environment:

It doesn't feel like you're teaching them anything.

For me, that's incredibly off-putting.

Even when I was doing video more often (the very short-lived Flip 101 days), I felt like I was teaching something.  But changing over to a classroom where I do very little "sit up front and talk" or even very little "watch this video and take notes" means that I often go for days without delivering information.

For the last few weeks, I've been doing the following things:

--helping students curate their work (14 writing assignments in Essay Exposition, 10 in Language of Humour) on playlists on MentorMob.  I wish we had thought of this early.

--individual writing conferences with my Essay Exposition (SAX) students, where they choose one assignment from their portfolios and we discuss what their purpose, audience, tone, and intended effect.  It's been great to work with them so individually and really talk in-depth about their writing.  I think my Language of Humour class will be next.  I just wish they didn't take quite so long...

--analysing a text (The Crucible) through a variety of lenses: psychological, historical, and thematic, through Socratic Seminar, and essay and a project (recreating the Crucible in the modern day)

--evaluating texts that are not typically thought of as narratives (like Derren Brown's amazing work) through discussion and essay

--working on a project that will not only teach my SAX students how to do research and write persuasively, but will help them take action to fix a problem in their own community.  Pretty excited about how it'll turn out.

None of that really involves direct instruction.  Other than giving tasks and having conversations, I'm not "teaching."

I guess it's time to re-define what we mean by teaching.

An exchange on Twitter with another teacher facing an impending observation reminded me that at some schools, the list of activities above is actually much more what they're looking for than the old definition of teaching. 

While I have so many amazing things happening in my classroom, my evaluation still includes a piece on direct instruction; in that, I feel like I'm taking a small step backwards.

And maybe that's why I still don't feel like I'm teaching: my school (and students) still define teaching as "what teachers do at the front of the room, talking constantly, as students take notes."

So how do we redefine teaching in the post-flipped world?

Andrew and I have worked incredibly hard this year to make our team-teaching a success.  We spend hours planning over G+ Hangout, or in Google Drive documents, and we are pretty proud of what we've accomplished.  None of the material in our first unit was anything we had ever taught (with the exception of one of the short texts each).

We also believe in open source, free materials for teachers.  We do not intend to ever sell our materials.  We want to give them away for free with the caveat that you give us credit for the work.  We, by no means, want to present the material as if we think it's perfect - it's not.  There are lots of changes we will make when we teach it next (since we both have new students at the semester, it will be January-February when we teach it again).

But for now, here is the unit - complete with planning documents and links to every assignment, text, grading rubric, and warm-up.  If something is listed but doesn't appear, let us know and we'll fix it right away!  Almost all of the links are through Mentor Mob, since that's where we store our student playlists.

I hope you find it useful.  It's been amazing to plan and teach, and we hope that others can use some of the ideas we have developed here.

Here is the information from the document linked above:


The Master List of Unit 1 Resources
Andrew Thomasson and Cheryl Morris

Planning Documents:
Original Unit Plan (with full assignment descriptions, although a bit different from what we ended up teaching)
Skills Map (Thomasson’s iteration)  
Morris’ iterations: 1 2 (Morris modified her maps from the main document)

Playlists:
Weeks 1-3 (Morris)   
Weeks 1-2 (Thomasson)    
Smoke in Our Lights (both)    
Weeks 3-6 (both)

Unit Goals:

1. Introducing students to the technical processes they need for the class
2. Easing them into the flipped class part - how to watch video, how asynchronous instruction works, how mastery grading works, etc.
3. Familiarise them with the patterning strategy and why we use it
4. Making inferences based on evidence
5. Constructing a definition, both in narrative and informational writing
6. Collaborate with peers on a variety of tasks, and differentiate that from doing Group Work.

Essential questions:

• What is a flipped class, and how does OUR flipped class work?
• What goes into a good definition, and how does that differ based on genre and purpose?
• What is the best way to collaborate, and how is that different from cooperative learning/group work?
• What is a pattern and how do those patterns build meaning in a text?
• How do you access meaning beyond the literal/surface level?

Since our classes are asynchronous much of the time, this is mostly a suggested pacing, and is close to our actual pacing.  It took Morris six weeks, with about 240 minutes per week (11th-12th graders), and it took Thomasson four and a half weeks, with about 450 minutes per week (10th graders).  Please use any resources freely, so long as you give us credit for our work.

There are a lot of people who will tell you that mastery grading won't work with English.

Andrew Thomasson and I disagree.  We're doing it, actually, and it's working pretty well so far.

Here's our video explaining the philosophy and basic principles of Mastery:

Our Mastery system is based in large part on an idea stolen from Jon and Aaron.  Here's our latest grade table:

In this first unit, we are assessing the following things for mastery:
1. Process of posting to their blog, accessing and using all their Google accounts
2. Making an inference based on evidence
3. Writing an essay that defines who they are through a transformational experience
4. Developing a project that shows mastery of a concept
5. Having a conversation with a group that shows their ability to come to a collaborative definition
6. Reading a text and finding patterns
7. Making meaning of those patterns to determine author's intent

Some of those are processes, and some are about content.  This whole first unit is built on the idea of Explore Flip Apply, and all of those skills and processes were developed throughout the unit in that way.  As an example:

Patterning
Explore: Students read a text and find any repeated ideas or patterns.  Discuss with group to find commonalities.

Flip: Students watched this video:

Apply: Students went back through the text and made meaning from the pattern we found but didn't explicitly trace in the video.  They had to have a group discussion with us to demonstrate that they understood the pattern and how it affected the meaning in the text.

We patterned several other texts in that way (some with a video, some with live in-class modelling of the patterns we found), and the final assessment will ask students to pattern a new text and make meaning of it on their own.

***

Now, we still live in a point-based reality.  So somehow, we need to give students points for getting to mastery.  The way we decided to make it work is to give students all the points for showing mastery, and none if they didn't.  At the end of the unit, the assessment is graded on a rubric, but all other strands are all/nothing.  So 20 out of the 55 unit points are graded on a rubric.  That means that about 1/3 of the unit points are in the assessment and NOT all/nothing.

If students get all the points for the classwork, the most they can get is an 85% - to get the other 15%, they need to complete the Blank White Page project work for the unit.  This is straight-up stolen from Karl Lindgren-Streicher.  Thanks, buddy.

The last thing to mention is the Behind Line.  That's the date on which work should be completed, but students are not "late" until the unit is over.  I don't think we'll take work after the unit is over, but we need to see how it shakes out before deciding for sure.  It's all based on the idea that students can work ahead, but not fall behind.  Often, we will still do synchronous work in class, so we want students to stay near the same point through this unit.  Again, we'll reassess later.

The students are responding positively to this - in fact, they've stopped asking about their grades now, and seem to trust that this is as straight-forward as we keep promising. The true test will come at the end of the unit.

The way Andrew and I have been teaching is new for our students.

It's new for us, for that matter.

It's not the Teacher Lectures and Student Studies the Textbook paradigm.  And our students really struggled with the transition.

So I decided to ask them what they were learning in my class.  We've been working on these three playlists.

I wasn't expecting much because it really seems like they weren't "getting it" and making the right connections.

Here were the results for the topic:

What are you learning in this class?  What do you think we want you to know/be able to do?


Wordle (all classes combined)

Original notes from the 1st period discussion:

Sorry it's not super legible.  The check marks indicate when another group said something that was already up there.

I'm really proud of them.  

They ARE learning! :-)

And if those next 179 days are as amazing as the first two, it's going to be a hell of a year.  

I didn't start off by telling them about the flipped classroom.

I didn't even start off by showing them a video.

We didn't use much technology.

I gave them a Blank White Page, and they wrote questions on one side, answered one question from me (Who are you?) on the other, and took two pictures.

And the coolest thing that happened was that by 3rd period, kids came in talking about how excited their friends had been after leaving my first two classes.  I had numerous colleagues, including several in the SPED department, tell me that kids had raved about how good my class was.

And that was just the first day.

Today we had LOTS of technical difficulties, but we managed to work through most of the playlist I had set up.  I even have some kids done with it entirely.  Like completely done.  With all 10 assignments they've had over two days.  And no one is behind.  Work ahead, but don't get behind is working.  So far.

I will post more thoughts when I have time, but I seriously can't believe that they pay me to work at this school.  Unreal.

As teachers, we have lots of opportunities to think about, plan for, and look back on first days.  We're trained to think in terms of "starting strong" and told to "not smile until [insert fall/winter holiday here, depending on how strict you are]" - that if we don't "set firm boundaries" that we can "never be more strict than we are on the first day."

I think that's all crap.

Am I anti-structure?  No.  I think you'll find that beneath the seeming-chaos in my room, there is a definite order and structure to what's happening.  In the next few weeks, Andrew and I will be writing in depth about, and sharing all our resources/plans for our course.  There has to be order for the chaos to function effectively.  You will see a few of our resources at the end of this point so you have more of a framework to understand what our classes look like.

****

At one time, my ideal classroom looked a lot like an example from a Harry Wong book.  Students were conditioned (some would say manipulated) to perform actions by rote to the point that class runs without teacher guidance.  

It's funny how close the end result is to flipped class, while being on the complete opposite pedagogical scale.  In a flipped class, students take responsibility for their LEARNING, which leads them to use behaviours that make the classroom function seamlessly, whereas in a Harry Wong class, students take responsibility for their actions, which is supposed to make the learning function seamlessly.  

But what often happens is that students learn to act that way in one context, at one time.  How many students sit in a classroom like that and by the end of the year permanently morph into compliant, disciplined learners?  No, they go to the next class, and if the teacher has different structures, they start all over.  Even if the teacher is similar, at some point, they will be expected to do more than show up, take notes, and follow procedures.  And they won't know how to do it.

In a flipped class, the idea is that when you teach students the habits of mind, the skills, and the knowledge they need to be responsible for their own learning, they also start to learn that certain behaviours are more conducive to them reaching mastery, so they start regulating themselves without even thinking about it, in order to push themselves and their peers to learn more.  This is exactly what happened in my class last year - they went from unmanageable to self-managing.  In a matter of weeks.

So both Harry Wong and flipped class reach similar end results in terms of behaviour, but vastly different in terms of learning and attitude.  And if we really think about it, as educators, which should we value?  Should we value teaching students to be compliant, while explicitly managing their behaviour for them through the use of punishments and rewards?  

Or should we be teaching our students how to engage in the messy and beautiful process where making mistakes, failing, trying again, and finding their own way out helps them find not only what they were looking for, but something that is far more valuable: the ability to find, manage, curate, and create information in any discipline, situation, or venue?


****

As someone who values backwards planning, I like to start with my desired end result before I know where to begin.  If I want students who can think critically and creatively, who can build and use with skill a toolkit more vast than just the one used in my own discipline, and who refuse to give up when they fail, but instead reach out to find different solutions from the resources available to them, then starting the year with Harry Wong just won't cut it.

It's why I'm starting with Blank White Page, a project where students generate questions, then find answers to those questions.  They can work on their own, or with peers (from their own school or from three others around the country).  They can use any resources they can find.  They have complete freedom on what to study, how to study it, and how to demonstrate their knowledge.

It's why I'm starting with a video introducing not only myself, but Andrew as well.  Where we explain why we've decided to team-teach their class from 2,500 miles apart.  Where we model what it looks like to have your ideas become something better than you ever could have imagined.   

But most of all, it's why I flipped my class.  I don't know of any other way to teach students to be who and what I want them to be...no, who they NEED to be to succeed in the "real world" outside my classroom.

There are lots of things I want my students to understand about me and about the class on the first day.  But I'm not the centre of my classroom anymore.  If I stand up and talk about my rules and policies on the first day, then I'm still trying to be the centre.  I am communicating to them that what's really important is ME and them following MY rules, MY procedures, and fitting into MY world.  I am telling them that I have all the answers.

That's why I'm not going to talk much on the first day.  I am going to assess my students on the first day - who they are, what they know, what interests them, how they interact, what they expect from school, who they like/hate, etc.  I am collecting evidence and making inferences...which is exactly what I'm teaching them how to do in the first unit.  Because THEY are important.  And the end goal is for THEM to learn, to grow, and to succeed.  

I want them to see that NO ONE has all the answers.  That there will always be blank white pages ahead of them, and it is their job to find ways of filling them in most effectively.  I want their life to be a Blank White Page project - prompted by curiosity, driven by a constant search for answers, and always building towards becoming a life-long learner.

So as I plan for the first day, I ask myself if I'm backwards planning for that end goal.  Will our students walk away equipped with a toolkit that will transfer from the content taught in our class to the content of the rest of their lives?  Will they learn not just compliant behaviours, but habits of mind, skills, and how to be a critical and creative thinker?

****

First days are important, sure.  But what's really important is the LAST day, and thinking forward to One Day, when they leave our class and go on to whatever comes next.  The time when routines and structures are gone, and they are left facing their future.  Will they see something that is chaotic because they have no one imposing structure on them?  Or will they see a blank white page that is just waiting to be filled in and expanded and created?

I know which one I'd choose for them.





I linked to a few videos in the post, but here are some other resources for our first unit:
Mentor Mob Playlists for BWP and Strand 1
Video playlist for unit 1

It seemed like a bad idea a few days ago.

I didn't want to come here.  I had too much work to do, I had cats to tend, I had Very Important Things, none of which could be done if I took a vacation.

But thankfully, I have people in my life who push me to do things that are good for me, even when I don't want to do them (you know who you are).

So I've been at Asilomar in Pacific Grove, California for the last day and a half.  This summer has been at a relentless pace - blogging, video filming, video editing, tweeting, conferencing (virtual and one in-person), meeting with teachers from my new school...even the road trip I did a few weeks ago was relentless, covering 2,500 miles and nearly the entire length of the West Coast in a week.

And now, the start of school is staring me down.  I know many of you will have started already, either with students or with back-to-school PD.  I am lucky to have until Monday before I am expected to attend anything, and two weeks from tomorrow until the students are expected to attend anything.

And instead of continuing the relentless push for planning out the year, hammering out the details of team-teaching with someone 2,500 miles away, doing paperwork to make sure I get paid...

Instead of doing those things, I am at Asilomar, by the sea.  

And here is what I DID do:

I finished The Things They Carried.  I read parts of Price of Privilege, The Years (Virginia Woolf), Bird by Bird, and How to Think and Write about Literature.

I sat, staring at the ocean, getting sunburnt and catching the way the fog melted away above the trees.

I wrote.  What started as a one-page attempt to write a descriptive essay about a coffee shop turned into a larger creative non-fiction project.  The only reason it became that is because my collaborator read it, and saw the seed of something bigger than a coffee shop.  He cut it to pieces and made it make sense.  Then he told me to stop thinking and start writing.

Before I got to Asilomar, I had about 19 pages.  Now, after I've taken his advice (finally), there are more than 40.  Some parts are good, others are horrible, and some are great.  But what matters far more than quantity or quality is that I actually wrote.  


******


In college, I wanted to be a writer - creative non-fiction or academic, I didn't care - but through time, circumstance and several discouraging realities, I stopped writing.  Even starting this blog was daunting, because publishing for a global audience of professionals was much different than writing lessons or sample essays for my students.

For me, what it took was the seed of an idea.  And someone to encourage me, even before it was any good.  To edit parts to make them more clear, or precise, or profound, but mostly, to hear the story I was telling and help me find the voice I needed to tell it better.

*****

Because of that experience, and many more like it, I start this year, completely obsessed by one question: 

How do I get my students to experience the joy of collaboration, the freedom of writing, and the beauty of learning?

Because this summer has taught me that all three are things of great value, to be sought after and treasured.  And all three have made me a better teacher, a better friend, and a better human being.  If I can get my students to have the kind of year I crammed into the last six weeks of summer, I will feel successful (and I bet they will too).

I want them to be able to try out ideas, knowing they might fail, but if they do, there's no one to mock you.  And sometimes, the other person can make the idea a success in a way you never thought possible, and suddenly, it's ion lucidity, and it's magical.

I want them to see learning as something intrinsic to human experience.  That we are all constantly learning, whether through making inferences about the environment or other people, or reading a book, or walking through a Safeway.  That learning is not bound by the classroom walls.

I want them to see knowledge not as a capacity for facts, but as the way you use facts to make deeper meaning of your world.  When they get in an argument about whether Eucalyptus trees are native to California, or what street Voodoo Doughnuts in Portland is on, or whether the exact linguistic phrasing they used was constructivist or behaviouralist, I want them to say, "Hang on, I'll Google it."  

And if and when they were wrong, I want them to laugh it off and apologise for insulting their friend's mother.  And most importantly, I want them to take what they've learned and make meaning out of it, rather than just being content with knowing facts.  
(and yes, those are real examples from this summer...all except the insulting of mothers.)

I want them to spend hours listening to their close friend talk about how their life feels like a series of roadblocks.  I want them to give advice, some bad, some good, but do it because they care so much about the person they want the best for them.

I want them to be rooting so hard for their friends that there isn't a hint of competition anywhere.  That any victory their friend finds is shared, and more valuable than a victory for themselves.  I want them to have people to trust and who trust them.  I want them to make mistakes, and learn how to ask for forgiveness and reconcile the relationship.

I want them to have the summer I had.


*****

That is the essence of the MetaFlip.  Taking all these experiences in which we as educators and human beings find value and meaning, and making them accessible to our students.  Breaking it down into processes and showing them how to navigate through challenges and failures.  Showing them what friendship and collaboration are, especially at times where the mess threatens to overwhelm the relationship.

Building assignments that are not just personalised, but are personal.  That take the things we value - friendship, collaboration, learning, writing, reading - and presents those things to our students in a way that gives them a foothold to do each for themselves.

*****

Do we know how to do this right now?  Not quite.  But we have some ideas:

1. The projects that Andrew, Karl, Crystal, Kate and I have been working on this summer will turn in to model projects for the Blank White Page project.  Students will see our authentic products and how we created them to help them understand how to make it something meaningful.

2. In every video series, Andrew and I are aware of our process as much as our content.  We want to make the students see the process and try it out, rather than just loading them up with content and asking them to apply it on their own.  We want the end of every unit to have some reflective time about how they are doing, how their collaboration with peers has been, what they need to work on/change to make the next project even better, how they can improve the way they're learning...etc.

3. The reading will always have a component of personal education.  We will talk about concepts like ubuntu, or ion lucidity, or love or friendship.  We will show students that we don't have all the answers, but we're learning.  That is the most powerful tool in our toolkit, I think.  We are willing to fail, and then demonstrate resilience.  We are willing to try something, reflect on it, and ditch it if it doesn't do what we want it to do.  We are willing to make our lives as transparant as possible so students can see through the glass and into our heads.  It's scary, but it's exciting.

4. We have to show the mess.  Andrew and I will be team-teaching this year.  Both our names will be on the board, and on the syllabus, even if our classrooms are 2,500 miles apart.  The introduction video we do will be both of us.  We will be teaching the same skills at the same times, albiet with slightly different content to fit our own school/curricular context.  

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We are embarking on this team-teaching endeavour because we love working together, yes.

But we are also doing it so our students can see a model of how to work with someone else.  How to make your ideas better by sharing them.  How to have fun, but still be productive.  We've never seen the other person teach (except on video), so I'm sure obstacles will arise, but I'm equally sure that we will come up with such amazing solutions to overcome those obstacles that we will remember them as blessings, rather than as trials.  

Teaching is hard in isolation, but teaching in a flipped class is impossible without collaboration.  There is no way you can go it alone.  The Great Myth of American individualism is that you can be wholly self-reliant, and that's the highest form of human existence.  The Great Myth of the American teacher is that they comes up with the perfect lesson on the way to school and then it changes lives in seconds...

But that's not the reality.  The reality is burnout, playing the political game, avoiding people with an axe to grind.  The reality is long, lonely hours, with too much to do and not enough time.  The reality is that half of those who enter the profession will have left it within five years.

For all those reasons, we have to fight back against these myths.  Working with someone who makes you better is far, far better than trying to struggle through on your own.  Collaboration sharpens your ideas, and magnetises them to the point that you are surrounded by so many ideas you just don't know where to start.  And then collaboration helps you find the best idea, polish it, and put it into action.

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But sitting here in Asilomar, I'm reminded that there will be time for all of sharpening, the collecting, the selecting, the polishing.  There will be time for lesson design, and video production, and blank white page...

...after I return.  

Right now, the only thing I need to do is model resting, relaxing, and reading.

Yesterday during the #140edu conference, I began to think about the technology that plays a large role in my life.  Here is what I use primarily:

1. MacBook Pro, 17' with the apps I use the most: Camtasia, Adobe Photoshop Suite, Chrome, uTorrent, iTunes, and VLC

2. iPad 3 (Verizon) with ShowMe, Messaging, Mail, Twitter/HootSuite, DailyBible, Flipboard, Edmodo, Notability, Instagram, Facebook, Camera, Music and Paper 53

3. iPhone 4 with most of the same apps as the iPad, Socrative and Pandora as well.

4. Web-based apps: Google Docs (including shared folders and live collaboration with the #cheesebuckets), Dropbox, Weebly to maintain this site, BBC iPlayer through Expat Surfer, UKNova, Netflix, and Hulu Plus.

Now, why am I telling you all that?  Because I believe that it tells you something about who I am as a person, as a teacher, and as a learner.  Most of my news comes from Twitter.  All of my television/screen time is through my computer (I don't even have a TV).  All of my radio and music comes from what's stored between my three devices (and a really old iPod classic) and Pandora.  Most of the communication I have with friends is through Twitter, Facebook, and messaging. 

Even right now, I have all three devices open, working on different things (streaming the final of the men's gymnastic all-around competition on BBC and composing this on the MBP, Twitter on the iPad, messaging on the iPhone).  I take all three devices everywhere, because this is how I engage with the world. 

And I'm double the age of most of my students.  If technology is so important to me, then how much more is it to them, who have had it their entire lives?

But that's not the point of this post.  It is however, sort of relevant.

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As I was thinking through my preferences for technology use, I suddenly realised that it wasn't MY preference that matter.

In a flipped class, student-centred pedagogy is one of the three pillars.  So why am I the one setting the requirements?

Now, there my plans/goals for my students:
1. I want all students to blog
2. I want an LMS, either Moodle or Edmodo or both
3. I want to use google docs
4. I want all students to use an RSS feed for SSR time
5. I want to use a backchannel for live response
6. I want to participate in the KQED Do Now curriculum
7. I want students to collaborate outside of class time
8. I want students to watch some videos outside of class time

And there are some things I know about my students:
1. They all have gmail and google docs and like them
2. Most don't have Twitter accounts
3. They use Moodle
4. Most have their own devices to use in class
5. They are not used to using technology in class. At all.

So there are a lot of pieces of information I don't know yet.  But here's what I do know:

I need to allow my students to drive the technology in my class.  Instead of teaching them all new tools, I need to help them gain proficiency in the ones they already have and know.  When it comes down to it, I need to embrace the mess and allow my students to teach me sometimes, rather than me having all the knowledge.  I need to use their passion for technology and show them how to make it relevant to my class.  I need to put aside my preferences and be willing to not be the expert in order to better meet their needs.

So I don't have a completed plan for what technology I will use.  And that has to be okay.  I have a starting place: Moodle, Google Docs, and a BYOD policy.  And I have lots of question marks: Will I require a Twitter account?  Will I use YouTube?  Will I use Google+ hangout?  Will I use Edmodo?

I don't know.

I DO know that I don't want to give my students a worksheet asking them what they use.  Here are some ideas for how I might gather this information:

1. Have students enter the names of their technology into a Google form (much as I did at the start of this post) and then create a Wordle from it.

2. Use the start of year video to show my technology, and have students write a blog post or create a video of their own showing theirs.  Yes, this is time consuming, but I can really learn a lot from this about my students and their context.

3. Ask students to put together a photo essay about their technology use.  Turn this into an essay.  It has nice thematic links to the Snapshot of a Modern Learner article.  It could even be part of the essay on that text.

4. As the first project in Blank White Page.  Again, the video I make could be the model for this to show them what BWP is all about. 

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I'm sure there's a better idea out there of how to do this.  Feel free to comment and tell me your ideas for non-worksheet ways you collect this information from your students.

This post gives one of the reasons I use video in my flipped class.  Click here to read the frame narration for some context on why I'm making this argument. 

1. Using video has brought a collaborative partner, Andrew Thomasson, who has made me a better teacher and made nearly everything you've read on this blog in the last month possible.  We will be team-teaching from across the country this year.  We will be doing most of our videos together as well.  A few people said to me that my students will know him as well as they'll know me.  I think that's awesome.  If they don't connect with me perfectly, I've given them another teacher with whom they can connect.  

There is no way I could do that in any other way.  Process videos, in my opinion, work better with two people so that the thinking is far more apparent through the conversation than it would be in a monologue.  For my students, they will get to see two "experts" try, fail, try again, fail again, and support each other.  It models many things more powerful than I've ever been able to show my students: how to work with a partner, how to revise as you go, how to explain your thinking, how to push the other person to do better, find a more precise word, and build a better paper.

If I flipped without video, none of that could happen.

But giving my students another teacher, one who complements my weak areas, one who helps to clarify my thinking, and one who makes me excited to be a teacher again.  It gives me someone to bounce ideas off on, and to push me farther than I thought I could go.  It makes me a far better teacher for my students.

And if I haven't convinced you to use video yet, click here for reason two.  And click here to go back to the main post.

And because I'm really, really proud of the work we've done, here is the playlist of all 20 videos in the (completed!) Research Paper series.