Day 1 of the Connecting Cohort with Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach at High Schools New Face Conference

For those of you that are new to Web 2.0, you may not have heard of Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach. She is incredibly knowledgeable and writes extensively about the integration of technology and Web 2.0 tools. Sheryl is professor at William and Mary College. Sheryl is committed to 21st Century learners and how to help educators move to 21st Century “teaching”. I discovered her blog and instantly we were connected. The fact that I was a superintendent interesting and using Web 2.0 in my daily work as well as attempting to have our high school teachers integrate the tools she included me as a “virtual mentor” for a pre-service course she teaches to college students on the way to becoming teachers. I was able to engage with her students, be a resource for ideas and issues they experienced as they were student teaching. We’ve had many interactions since then although we met face-to-face for the first time yesterday. Sheryl invited me to call in using SKYPE about my use of Web 2.0 at a conference she presented at in New Zealand this spring. It is incredible the contacts you make in the virtual world. Just by looking at the map on my blogroll (http:changinghighschools.blogspot.com), you can see how many people from every corner of the world have visited by blog. Often these people will comment on my blog, call me by SKYPE or e-mailed me to set up a time for an interview that would be recorded into the podcast.

Each participant was given an iPod Shuffle for the conference. This was a donation from Apple. The Shuffle can also be used as a 1 gig hard-drive. You need to have iTunes loaded on the computer you will use your Shuffle. Shuffles don’t like to use more than one computer. iTunes on a school computer is “safe”. iTunes has parental controls that can be set to make sure students don’t get exposed to the “radio” or other locations undesirable for students.

Adam Frey is a great resource. 100,000 free wikispaces are available for wikis without any advertising on it.

Sheryl has set up a wiki for the conference.
http://21stcenturylearning.wikispaces.com/

If you go to "Resources" you can find a link for wikispaces and many other tools.

Sheryl spoke about our changing world and how we are going to prepare student. Some key bytes:

Knowledge is divergent, not linear

Have you used the new WWW? The new WWW: Whatever, Wherever, Whenever.

iPod + podcasting= Anytime Learning

What about kids using iPods in School?

What about using cell phones?

“This is not business as usual, it’s business as unusual!”

What do you need to know when most of recorded knowledge is a mouse click away?

How do we prepare students for the jobs that don’t exist yet...using technologies that have not been invented yet…?

What does it due to the body of knowledge when everyone is a producer and knowledge isn’t static anymore?

How do we balance safety and access in order to allow the use of Web 2.0 technology.

Are you ready for the 21st Century? IT’S HERE!! We’re 7 years into it!

Web 3.0 is here. Take Web 2.0 and the technical aspects and learn from an Avatar such as in Second Life.

It is estimated that 1.5 exabytes of unique information will be generated this year.

What is 21st Century Learning? (It is so much more than technology)Some say;
The ability to establish ambiguity
Being your own reference librarian
Being able to network with people that have the resources you need


4 Areas that include 21st Century Learning
Digital Age Literacy
Inventive Thinking
Effective Communication
High Productivity

We need to give students a skill set so they are marketable and not competing with jobs that are outsourced?

There are 4 other Iroquois folks here at the conference attending other cohorts. Pat Aroune is here in the connecting cohort. Mr. Kenney, Mr. Esslinger and Mr. Lysiak are also here. I'm anxious to hear what they have learned in their first session.