Frustrated

Yesterday I gave a workshop to a group of art teachers. The theme of the workshop was incorporating digital tools onto the elementary art classroom. I used a wiki to present and demonstrate various ideas I have used or plan on using.

Some teachers caught on very quickly to the concepts involved, others struggled but kept trying but a few just gave up and did not try.

I was a little frustrated with the last group because I thought that if the teachers would just by try a little harder that they would get it.

Well today I have a little more understanding of the teachers that just gave up. I was working on my “second job” which involves rolling schools in our district over to Active Directory. Part of that process is preparing for folder redirection which is how users data is stored. I have a very small part of that process which is checking that users are in the right folders.

The other part is applying the group policy for folder redirection. I watched one of the network administrators do just that and I have no idea what magic he did. I could not even begin to duplicate the process or even describe what happened on the servers and domain controllers he worked on.

So those of you that were in my workshop and left feeling that the workshop was given in Greek I feel your pain. I’m not sure how many times I would have to be shown the process of “applying a group policy” before I got it if I ever would. But I’ll keep trying. And I hope that the teachers from my workshop will also.

Thats it. Now Austin...

Thats it. Now Austin is tucked away in his dorm room, his bags unpacked, groceries on the floor, computer running. listen

Powered by Jott

Stop and think.

I have been thinking about the 4 boys who lost their lives in the Little Sioux Scout Ranch in Blencoe, Iowa. This makes me think about all the boys who wear the Scout Uniform and what it can mean.
On a personal level I have seen my son grow to a man in Scouts. During his time in Scouts Austin went from a little boy who was afraid on camp outs and had to sleep in the same tent as me. To a young man who during his Eagle project went to a foreign country to help other children there. Scouting gave him the confidence to do that.
Listen to this story from NPR and think "shouldn't more boys be involved in Scouts" http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91514659

Something else to think about.

This is an interesting video by some students from the Savannah College of Art and Design. Now I'm not a big player of video games or even on-line games, except for Parking Wars on Facebook. I use to play video games in college but that was limited to PacMan and Frogger. When my son turned 16 my wife and I allowed him to get the video game Grand Theft Auto. After he got the game I sat with him and watched him play. There was a lot of shooting, stealing of cars, and other inappropriate things going on. And imagine my delight when he "earned" enough points to become a Drug Lord. But I watched the game with him and I talked to him about what was happening. I came to understand that what he saw happening on GTA was about as real to him as it was for me when I tried to hop from log to log in Forgger.
So as with any other technology or activities your children participate in the best thing that you can do to ensure that it is appropriate for them is be involved. Don't depend on anyone or anything else to protect them, likewise don't expect to place blame on anyone else.

Thinking Outside the Box

I've been thinking lately about creativity, innovation and new media.
Firstly I have come to believe that the children that I am teaching are learning skills for jobs that do not yet exist.
I have found two examples of blending ideas and knowledge and talent to create a new way of seeing.

MUTO a wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.
This is a video created by Blu a graffiti artist and animator. Its an amazing video, really thinking outside the box.

in the above music video the band Get Out Clause used videos gleaned from London's vast CCTV security system to edit together a music video.

Now these are two examples of very creative, innovative thinking what will happen with these ideas I don't know. But there have been recent examples of very outside the box that have created new industries. Facebook, less than 5 years ago a student at Harvard created a way for other Ivy league students to socialize online. Now although its founder claims no plans to sell the company Facebook has been valued at between 1 to 8 billion dollars. Wow that is really taking anew idea to the extreme.

End of the year

Only about 11.5 days left on the school year. It doesn't see possible. So many things planned but not yet accomplished and other things that I didn't plan on done.
I've actually got quite a few teachers at my school venturing into web 2.0 teaching. One is creating a wiki with her students about the history of the area around Mary E Bryant. Two other first grade teachers are working with their students creating MixBooks of art work created in my art class. Both of these projects are big steps for the teachers.

View this book full size or get a printed copy at Mixbook

Next year should be very interesting because the theme for the year is going to be " Learning through Technology" or something to that effect I'm not sure what that means or where that will lead us next year but where ever that is it should be an adventure.

Getting ready for College

I'm sitting here with my son going over his college loan information. Ohh what an eye opener...for him. "Dad I have to start paying it back right after I graduate?" Yes I told him. "Bummer."
They all want to grow up so fast and then when kids get there it's quite a shock to find that the adults were not quite having all the fun that kids thought that they were.
I'm sure that my son will do well in school and its both fun and scary to see him growing up.