Tag Archives: Connections

Marathon Man

As the year comes to close there will be the inevitable litany of blog posts recapping achievements, documenting successes and reflecting on next steps. Kim Cofino started it with her latest post, and since I am flying to Lombok tomorrow and hoping to take a much-deserved break from Twitter and Edublogging, I want to gather my thoughts here, now, in this blog post.

Unfortunately my list of accomplishments may sound a bit more personal than Kim’s, because I am not really working within a Tech team, regardless I would like to thank my colleagues at school, and my wife/team member/tech protégé Mairin Raisdana for being so open and hungry to learn about technology and move forward. So where to start?

It is a bit taboo and perhaps considered vain to talk about numbers, but since it is clear I have no issues with ego, awards, or numbers counting, I will start there. My numbers are up!

I am sure there are many that will say numbers don’t matter, but for someone who started a few years ago writing to an audience of one, it is encouraging and rewarding to watch the bars on the graph grow taller and taller. I am not arguing that higher numbers mean success or a better blog, or a better community, but I am saying that the more people stop by and read my blogs, the more chance there is to build authentic connections. Beyond the numbers, however, the thing I am most proud of and happy with are the consistent comments from my regular readers. People like Will Chamberlin, Adrienne Michetti, Clint Hamada, Cathy Crea, Melanie McBride, Tim Bray, and Keri Lee Beasley (There are so many more to mention!) have proven time and time again that having a small committed readership is more important than a huge one. So while increasing numbers are a good way to build a robust readership, a blog must have a foundation of people who look to it as a pleasure to read and with which to connect. I know that I have a support system in place that challenges my thinking, supports me and my students, and offers me material on which to reflect. So why mention numbers?

Over the last semester as my blogs have gained popularity, my voice and ideas are reaching more people. Through Twitter and my two blogs I have been able to connect with a variety of people worldwide. School kids in Canada, a variety of online interviews, and of course face-to-face connections. I have been accepted to present at the 21st Century Learning Conference in Hong Kong, and I am speaking with Melinda Alford about leading a cohort at the next Learning 2.0 conference in China. I have had constructive feedback on my teaching more here, and support for the blogging initiative I am trying to spearhead at our school.

Wow! That’s a lot of hyperlinks. Which means it has been a busy productive term. For people who are new to this online world of networks and connections, I hope my recount can shed some light on the power of blogging and connecting. It is not my intention to brag about my work, but to show what powerful professional development maintaining a blog can be. I was able to do all of this in addition to the in house “real” work I am doing on campus, building an ESL department from scratch, learning about the MYP, and helping the IT team move forward on schoolwide initiatives!

Furthermore, my students are making great progress within our classroom. I am experimenting and pushing the boundaries of what second language learners can do when given the tools to express themselves. In short, I am doing what I love and modeling behavior I would like to see in our school.

How does this happen? How did I go from blogging to myself to creating an authentic, caring, supportive, critical group of individuals who read my work, comment, share tweets, and invite me to conferences?

Consistent, open, honest sharing. This is the model that has worked for me. Everyone says they haven’t the time to blog or connect or do anything other than what the curriculum demands of them. I simply find that to be a cop out. In addition to what I have described above, I am raising two kids, writing a book, and leading a pretty satisfying rich life. I am not trying to say that I am superman and you should be like me; I am simply pointing out that building these networks takes time and energy and it is hard work, but if you take baby steps and stay with it it will bare fruit. Managing time is a choice we all make. If you are serious about blogging, it must be built into your day. Even if it is a few hours a week, it must be consistent.

I often catch myself comparing writing/blogging with running. I don’t do the latter, but first saw the connection through the book What We Talk About When We Talk About Running. Writing is like a marathon, you take your time and pace yourself, but always have a goal in mind.

image by seeveeaar

My goal has never been to become an Edublog celebrity, or to leave my classroom and present at conferences worldwide. I have only ever wanted to share my ideas, my thoughts, and yes my feelings in the most honest way I can to connect with as many individuals across the world as I can. I see this connection as the first steps toward understanding, which eventually I believe leads to a more just and peaceful world. A marathon indeed.

So as 2010 comes to close, I want to thank everyone who has supported me this year with your comments, tweets, external validations and of course love. I feel proud of the work I am doing and I owe much of its success to you. Whoever you, where ever you are reading these words.

Now I am off to Lombok to enjoy some of this:

image by Fadil Basymeleh

I look forward to spending time with family, friends, and my thoughts. Looking forward to disconnecting for awhile, taking a break from Twitter and blogs and enjoying the ocean, my daughter’s laughter, and my camera. See you all in 2011!

I’m No Expert, But I Can Help

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I recently had a great experience skyping into a grade three class at @gcouros’s school in Canada to answer a few questions about Islam. You can read about the logistics on George’s blog. I wanted to share my thoughts on the event here.

After speaking with the class around eleven PM last night, this morning I woke up to the following email from the classroom teacher, and rather than send my response to her in private, in the spirit of openness and sharing I have decided to post it here. My response comes after her email, which you can read below:

Hi Jabiz,

I just wanted to thank you again personally for Skyping with our class this morning. It was a very powerful experience and they learned a lot about the Muslim culture, country of Indonesia, and an important celebration of Ramadan and Eid-El-Fitr. I realize there is a big time difference between us and I really appreciate you connecting with us late on a Friday night. It was a very authentic and powerful experience for our students, as well as for me as a teacher. We have now used a thumbtack on our world map to indicate where you are and remember the connection we have with you, both through your commenting on our blog post, as well as Skype conversation!

George is sharing his passion with us and is teaching us how technology is a great medium in connecting with others. As I have just returned to school after a leave, I was quite apprehensive about the technology of our Smart Boards, new classroom blogs, etc. This truly has proven what can be done and the connections that can be made around the world. It is amazing and I am so proud and excited to be a part of it. Again, thank you.

Let me start by saying it really is my pleasure and I enjoy doing it. I was home, sadly to say wasn’t doing much else, and really had a great time doing it. It’s funny, once you open yourself up to these opportunities the more you will find will come your way. I have Skyped into classes all over the world from grade three to university courses, and each time it is different, but just as exciting. I am not sure why students get so excited by having someone else come into their classrooms, but we should take advantage of this enthusiasm and open our classrooms up to as many people as we can, people who can bring fresh insights and different perspectives. I am by no means an expert on anything really, but I feel that I have a voice and that my ideas are valuable. I see my world view as unique and feel that sharing it with others can bring value not only to them, but for me as well. This sense of appreciation for one’s own voice is at the heart of blogging and online life. This is what I hope to foster in my students. It is something to discuss with your kids as well. What are they experts in? How could they share their knowledge with others? I hope they can see that someday, I will need them to help and teach me and my kids. They are teachers and we are learners too.

I understand how one can be apprehensive and doubt the value of all this openness and sharing. But as I am sure you have sensed from George, this is just what we do. There is a new class of teacher, and we have knocked down the walls of classrooms down and are looking for any opportunity to teach and learn from as many people as we can. We are interconnected. We share knowledge, information, and resources fluidly and easily. We meet in person, we skype into classrooms. A class across the world has some questions about (insert topic) and we feel we have something to say we make the connections. This technology and these connections need not always be more complicated than that, as you have just seen from our Skype call. I hope this experience has shown you how easy it can be to join us. Just value your voice and build the connections. You are lucky to have such a passionate and connected administrator. Often times it is teachers who are pulling a school forward, but you have an administration who is there to help you. Take advantage. Your kids will thank you for it.

The next step of course is to connect students with students, but this often takes more time and planning, but once you are open to the idea of a classroom that shares their ideas with the world through blogs and Skype, the opportunities become easier and easier to find. Remind the kids that if they ever have any questions about Indonesia, they now have a person they know here that can help them out. We have some great podcasts for them to listen to and we would love comments as well. Good luck and stay in touch.

Peak Out From The Edges

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There is a lot of talk these days on the Interwebs, and I suppose for many days before now, about the new ways in which people are communicating, collaborating, connecting, and creating online. Eager teachers are promoting the use of the web in almost zealot evangelical ways, trying to convince everyone that the world will fall apart if their students are not creating Glogsters instead of posters, or having Skype calls with a class in India or Indiana.

I agree, for the most part, with the passion exhibited by these wide-eyed teachers. It is clear that we are in the midst of a monumental shift in the way human beings not only communicate and share reality, but more importantly in the ways we create and share stories. I am always asking myself, what does this all look like? Always the eager student (much more fun than being a teacher) I am always trying to push the ways I use my network. I want more form my PLN, Personal Learning Network ( I shudder at using those three letters, but can’t think of a better word yet.) than to troll through links to blog posts extolling the virtues of Web 2.0. I want my network to be a living breathing part of everything I do. I want to allow you into my spirit and see what comes out. I want to enter your reality and make a mess. I want to make you think. I want to rearrange your mental furniture. I want you to do the same for me. Nothing will be learned as long as we stay behind walls and peak out from the edges. If you really want to know what this web can do, come on out at play.

I don’t think this level of connection is possible without letting down my guard and being open to any and all opportunities to make as many connections as possible. This philosophy has opened so many strange doors for me in the last three years, that I can’t help but want to explore it further. Sure, I want to help expose my students to what it looks like to connect with people worldwide, but I am in the process of seeing what this looks like for myself.

These networks, this web has to be more than what we say it is. If there is more to the web, than what we have seen so far, how powerful could it be? How far can we push this idea of connectedness? Ultimately, I want to make authentic, lasting, powerful connections with the people I interact with online, but all that is theoretical mumbo jumbo. Let’s see what this looks like:

A few months ago I attended the Learning 2.010 conference in Shanghai where I met several people I had known quite well for a some time. These are people I have worked with and met in “real” life. I mention this only because apparently face-to-face meetings make relationships more authentic. The real reason I went to this conference, however, was to meet the other people, the ones who I had never met. This post is meant to be about a song, so let me try and stay on course. Long story short, I met several people and we found ourselves sitting at a bar talking about life, the Internet, teaching, music, freedom, revolution etc…

Leslie was one of those random, (I mean random in the best use of the word), connections who had joined our newly formed cohort. For the sake of brevity, I will let her tell you the story from her point of view. She does a great job of writing about it here.

I think that brings us up to the song. Here is that story: @onepercentyello, @klbeasley and I used Indaba to record a cover of Pearl Jam’s Nothingman. It was pretty simple really, I had known Keri Lee for almost a year through Twitter and our blogs. We hit it off really well when we finally met. That night in Shanghai @klbeasley gravitated toward @onepercentyello’s Ukulele and voice. I can’t remember exactly how we reconnected after we returned home, but there was surge in Tweets and someone mentioned that we should record a song together. I sent out the Indaba link and within days, @onepercentyello had laid a simple track with voice and Uke. I added my part a few days later and with a few gentle nudges @klbeasley added an amazing track with her voice.

The song could have been a bit more polished, and next time it just might be, but for our initial attempt it turned out pretty well. Once it was done, I couldn’t help but think that it had a soul but no body. I wanted a way to get more people involved and find a way to present it back to the webs. I am trying to drive this web 2.0 as fast I can get it to go. So I wrote this quick post and waited:

Over the next few weeks I sent constant reminders and watched the photos come trickling in. Interesting that no one from my “real” friends on Facebook even acknowledged the project, but the following people from Twitter sent images:

@cogdog
@klbeasley
@marklukach
@onepercentyello
@MaryAnnReilly
@b_sheridan
@fceblog
@Cayusa
@moominsean

This is by no means a @zefrank project, but I feel it is special in it’s own way. Three people living in three different countries who had never met a few months ago made music together. Then another group of unrelated people felt a strong enough need to send images to a song many of them may have never even heard. I can write all night about the implications of a project like this, but I will let you do that in the comments. The important thing is the art we created. Without further adieu, nothing man:

So am I wrong? Is this not a big deal? What does a project like this mean to you and your classroom? What have we learned about ourselves, art, our new reality? I will wait to hear from you before I comment further.

But it is not over yet! What can you now do with this post, this song, this video? Looking forward to hearing your thoughts. We are already talking about the next song ( I am leaning toward this one.) and maybe a name for the band. What do you think? Do you want to be involved? Leave it all in the comments where it belongs!

20,000/ 2000 My Voice Matters And So Should Yours

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Numbers don’t matter. That’s what we say right? But then in the same breath we sing the virtues of helping students create authentic audiences. Well if numbers don’t matter than who is sitting in the seats?

I hit a bit of a bizarre synergistic milestone today. I reached 2000 followers on Twitter and the exact same time I sent out my 20,000 Tweet.

So what? First off, I am a bit weird about numbers and how they line up. I don’t like the maths but I like symmetry in numbers. There seems to be some kind of secret to the universe or an explanation of chaos when numbers randomly fall into step and align.

So I was excited when a few week ago, I saw that there was a good chance I could make my 2’s connect. Adrienne Michetti even went so far as to publicly mock me for my OCD tendencies, but we are tight like that and I took it in stride.

I will admit that when both numbers were in the high 19’s I did curb a few tweets to make sure that the numbers would sink, but that seems like a tiny step considering I have sent out 20,000 Tweets in a few years and somehow 2000 people seem to care or at least tolerate the random things I seem to spew out endlessly. I have tried to keep the numbers authentic by blocking spam followers, but I am sure that the number of people actively listening is much lower then 2000, but what ever the number maybe it is higher than the 10 or 15 I started with.

And that matters! At least to me. Because that is my audience. These are the people, sorry, you are the people I have painstakingly culled from the entire world and convinced that what I have to say matters and is important. You are the people who read my words, give me advice, and yes often validation, but more importantly you are the people who have chosen to listen, and no matter what we try tell ourselves the larger that audience is the better. If we believe what we teach kids about how their voices matter, and that the new digital age is fantastic because it allows them to articulate, express and share that voice with a global audience, then I feel we too should find our voice and help it grow.

Now, I am not so vain to think that all 2000 people are hanging on my every word, and I would agree that I only truly have close authentic interactions with maybe 50 of you, but as my audience grows there is more of a chance that I will meet a few more kindred spirits who will connect me to a few more and so on and so on. This isn’t about fame or popularity, this is about using the power of a network to help us find our tribes and build communities working toward change. There are many much more intellectual voices out there who can write about the science behind networks and collectivism, I am just writing how I see it, in my own simple way. The more people who care about and listen to what I have to say, the stronger and more attuned our tribe.

A few years ago I had a personal blog my mom read, now I have several blogs, a youtube channel, and many other places online where I spread out my life to share with as many people as I can. I have created remarkable relationships with people all over the world, and have created an authentic audience for my voice. Isn’t that what we are teaching our students to do?

The best part is, I haven’t followed any scripts of what “good” blogging should be, or changed my style or ideas in anyways. I have been honest, open and passionate, and apparently 2000 of you think that is a good thing.

In closing, let me say- Thanks for all the support and energy you spend keeping up with my grammatically error ridden ramblings and for paying attention and caring about what the world looks like through my eyes. Here is to the next 20,000 Tweets and 2000 followers. See you soon at 40,000 and 4000! Bring your friends.

Oh and I must thank Kim Cofino for introducing me to this world of connectivity and offering me advice and guidance whether I wanted it or not. I’ve come a long way since she was my first and only follower. Thanks Kim.

I Want The World To Know

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At the end of every year, I select five students who I have had a profound connection to and give them a copy of Letters To A Young Poet by Rilke. I know the book is over most of their heads, as I usually teach Middle School; I didn’t discover the book myself until I was well into my twenties, but there is something about the simple passages that I feel resonate with the big ideas I try to convey in my classes. If you are not familiar with the book, here is what Wikipedia has to say:

The letters were originally written to Franz Kappus, a 19-year-old student at the Military Academy of Vienna, of which Rilke was an alumnus. Discouraged by the prospect of military life, Kappus began to send his poetry to the 27-year-old Rilke, seeking both literary criticism and career advice. Their correspondence lasted from 1902 to 1908. In 1929, three years after Rilke’s death, Kappus assembled and published the ten letters.

I share this book with the five kids who have shown some appreciation for art, learning, and living life to the fullest. They are not necessarily the “best” students or the most academically successful, but they get “it.” I think it takes a special person to understand passages like this:

“Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day.”

I woke up today to a very pleasant email. One of the students who received a book from me last year was James. James is an interesting story. Let’s just say he had/has a difficult time being a “good” student. He reads well beyond his grade level and can contribute some of the most insightful ideas I have ever heard at his age in class discussions, but ask him to sit still, write something down, work on one thing for a long period of time, or to simply calm down-forget about it. He is all over the place, off the wall; if you are into letter clarifications he probably has a few A’s, D’s and H’s somewhere in his file.

At the beginning of last year, I saw something in James. I saw that he was smart, curious, and hungry to learn. His problem was that school was not the place where he could do these things. I knew instantly that his inability to play the school game would be a challenge for him and his teachers. I sat him down early and talked to him about what the year might look like.

Throughout the year James would come into my room to chat during break, we sometimes had lunch; he would tell me personal details about his life and what he was thinking. In short, we built a relationship based on trust and respect.

I was open, honest and frank when it came to my frustrations when he got in a fight over a girl, but I also commended him on getting the lead in the school play. James had a fantastic year in my class. But what did that mean?

Did he score well on assessments? Not really, he continued to skate by with mediocre work. Did he learn a list of skills and new knowledge? Maybe, but nothing compared to how some of his peers performed throughout the year. So how I can I claim he had a great year? Because he went from being a socially awkward seventh grader who couldn’t care less about school or grades to a person who wrote me this:

Hi Sir,

First week of school is done and i am ready to go on holiday. You know that book that you gave me last year i have fingered out what “it” is. Well to start “it” is different in every person. So “it” is the driving force of life your soul your DNA the molecules the seed that starts your life. “it” is with you your whole life even after and before life. You will never find out what “it” is. “it” can hide itself in you forever in your body. But “it” will be somewhere so simple you will just look over it. Now i know that this is a very simple description but i am going to find where “it” is and what “it” is and tell you cause i see this as a mission, a mission that i will complete whatever it takes. this is cause i want to know i want the world to know. And most of all cause you gave me the idea and i am thankful to every thing that you gave me last year and will give me in later on in my life.

Buy for now hope to hear from you soon.

You may be asking yourself, who this kid’s English teacher was. Sure the paragraph could use some love and editing. Yes it would score very low on a rubric, but my point is that sometimes school should be a place to ignite the lingering passion in young people. So many times we extinguish every ounce of excitement these kids have with our curriculum and assessments and grades, when all they really want is for someone to listen to them, respect who they are, and help them find “it.”

I have shared this post with James, and want to ask him at this time- if you are here and reading James, let me say thank you. I am so glad that you are here and alive and connected and curious and searching. That was the whole point of the book, my class, my life. Life is beautiful and perfect and always looking for people like you to join and move the parade forward. Please remember that, I am an email or a blog post away. Let me know how else I can help you. The classroom is not the only place we can learn from each other; we have the whole world. Have a great year and keep in touch. How is our garden doing by the way? You may need to start a new plot! Do it now before it gets too hot. There is interest, but ideas need leaders, and there is no reason why that can’t be you.