Author: grabe

Layering update

I have not written about layering recently (you can search this site for the layer tag). A recent search for layering tools has prompted another post.

I use the term layering to describe an online service that allows a user to add content (annotations, highlighting, questions, external links) on top of the online content generated by a different individual. Actually, you could layer content on top of your own original content, but the core issues I want to address here involve the addition of content on top of what someone else has prepared. I use the word “layering” because the word offers a mental image I prefer. There is the content of the original author and there is the content generated by one or more different individuals. These “layers” of content are stacked so that the content of the original author appears as intended by that individual, but other content is added on top.

My interest in this capability is related to educational applications. I sometimes describe the opportunity a teacher has to take original content and to add elements to that content to generate a composite product that is more ideal as an instructional resource. These elements might include annotations intended to activate existing knowledge before reading new material, highlights added for emphasis, questions inserted to encourage beneficial cognitive activities or checks on understanding, etc.  I have written a small book for educators on this subject and offer free online resources.

Others see broader opportunities in what I describe as layering. Some describe the opportunity to “annotate the web” as a way to expand or criticize online content. For example, it would offer a way to identify falsehoods in online content or a way to add discussion to a primary source.

The opportunity to layer content on the work of other authors is not without controversy. I have written previously about the negative reaction some authors have to others commenting on their work. One comparison that might help you understand this negative reaction might be what happens when authors allow comments on their material – say a blog post or a YouTube video. Not only can comments be negative, but comments can be completely off target or involve personal attacks. To prevent such comments, content creators may turn off comments.

I can certainly see how such concerns could be valid, my focus has been on layering methods that are limited to a controlled group (a teacher and his/her class). A moderated use such as this would only reveal comments within the group and would allow the teacher to supervise. Some, however, may simply object to the appearance of a modification (even when the original content is still intact) without permission.

As I have explored various layering services I recommend to educators, I have become aware of a different concern. This concern is related to some of the various techniques by which a layer of content can be added to an existing web resource. I was investigating a service called Genius. This service has positive goals and influential technology backers. The service is very easy to use but it has been described as a proxy server that overrides certain security features  assumed by the original author. I have searched for more recent descriptions of how Genius works and sent an inquiry to the company for a comment on this concern, but to this point I am assuming the Verge concern (see link above) is still valid.

The practice of layering Internet content raises interesting questions. In what I consider the ideal application, the author’s original content is all presented (including ads) and the original content can be clearly differentiated from any annotations or added components by color or some other mechanism that makes clear what has been added. This composite is viewed by users who understand that what they see is a combination provided by multiple individuals and these viewers opt in to view this composite. By opt in, I mean the viewers must activate access to the service combining the inputs so that they understand what they are viewing is not the original. I don’t think existing copyright law would prevent this set of circumstances and I doubt the number of such services would exist should the practice be easy to challenge. You certainly don’t see comparable composites with print media, but similar composites in print would require republication of an original author’s work. This is a content model unique to the Internet.

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What you know strongly influences what you can learn

What you know strongly influences what you can learn. This principle applies to facts, experiences, and personal theories. From my perspective, it is one of the core principles of how learning happens that some ignore. Google search is not the answer to limited background knowledge. Of course, Google offers a remedy when you need a way find information, but many cognitive processes happen in real time when immediate recognition is essential and any disruption in immediate recognition comes at a substantial cost to understanding.

I have been writing lately about educational tribalism and the concern I have that the models of learning promoted within some tribes ignore the science of how learning happens. Putting down the importance of factual knowledge is one example of what I have observed. The factual knowledge a reader has available while reading is extremely important and studies show that the factual knowledge relevant to the topic of what is being read is more important than general comprehension skill. Since I believe that reading is probably the most important process by which we learn, belief systems that limit the application of this skill should be very troubling. I assume that the same principles apply to other real-time learning experiences (listening), but my background is more focused on how people learn from reading.

So, when it comes to learning from social media, I recommend that educators include some learning researchers within their feeds. To return to my example, here is a post on reading comprehension from Larry Cuban sharing a New York Times op-ed from Daniel Willingham. This post makes the case for the importance of existing knowledge in reading comprehension. I think Willingham does a good job of explaining the implications of cognitive research.

P.S. I do wish folks would include citations. Willingham’s description of the soccer knowledge study is new to me. I remember a very similar study (Recht & Leslie, 1988) making the same argument using knowledge of baseball to demonstrate how this knowledge was more important than reading skill in comprehending the description of a baseball game. Sports knowledge works well for this type of research as it is uncorrelated with reading skill and it would be possible to find groups of poor readers with great knowledge of the sport to contrast with good readers with poor knowledge.

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Why STEM?

I just finished evaluating the final projects for my grad Instructional Design and Technology course and one project raised some questions in my mind. The student’s project concerned the underrepresentation of women in STEM careers and particularly in computer science. Her analysis of the literature raised many of the familiar concerns – few female-oriented STEM toys, lack of positive role models and presence of negative role models, lack of career development in K12, and unresponsive higher education course experiences. The arguments were not new to me. My wife and my textbook reviews pretty much the same talking points in our chapter on programming.

I am certain there is an extensive literature on why and how individuals pursue specific careers. I am not familiar with this literature, but I assume it exists. This post is not about this topic. This post is about K-12 educators getting caught up in some causes and not others.

There is no doubt that fewer females than males pursue careers in computer science. Recent data I found claims that only 18% of the undergraduate majors in computer science are female. If one assumes that aptitude for computer science is randomly distributed for both males and females, it follows that those pursuing careers do not offer the best talent the country could bring into this important field. So, the underrepresentation of females with an interest in coding has become a very visible subtheme with the promotion of STEM. Hour of Code (early exposure to what programming is and programming careers) and more focused efforts (#girlswhocode) are popular educational efforts to address this issue.

My own professional experiences have provided me with a perspective on careers I would like K12 educators to consider. I have a science background (major in biology – a pretty much gender neutral STEM field) and advanced degrees emphasizing educational and cognitive psychology (again pretty much gender neutral fields of Psychology). However, I did spend much of my professional career as the administrator for a Psychology department with an emphasis on preparing clinical psychologists. If you investigate the graduation data for what I would describe as the employment level degree for mental health professionals – clinical psychologists, counseling psychologists, child clinical psychologists and school psychologists (these are careers requiring advanced training and a license to practice), you find some interest sex differences. 19% of recent school psychology graduates are male, 23% of school psychologists are male, 22% of clinical psychologists are male, and 23% of counseling psychologists are male. With the exception of developmental psychology, these are pretty much the only degrees that show this gender imbalance.

So, I would ask you to use your own experience to consider whether you have ever heard a K12 educator lament the failure of the education system to interest males in mental health issues? It cannot be that this is an irrelevant question as mental health problems have great public visibility and are a significant national challenge. If you look at the perspective of a client in need of services, I am guessing few with a programming task would care if the task was completed by a male or a female programmer. I can tell you with certainty that when it comes to clients needing clinical services, the clients can have preferences for whether their problems are addressed by a male or a female clinician.

So, educators, you tell me. Why have you become so interested in STEM and are willing to ignore mental health? Maybe no one has ever brought this problem to your attention. Now you know.

 

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Collaborative photo collections in Google Photos

Google Photos offers the opportunity to create a photo album allowing invited individuals to contribute images. This collaborative opportunity seems perfectly suited to classroom projects.

I had not explored this capability until attending a recent wedding and recognizing just how many individuals were taking photos the best of which could be integrated for all to view.

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Getting what you need

You can’t always get what you want

But if you try sometime you find

You can get what you need

Words from the Rolling Stones.

When I was an administrator, I did some things that were probably weird for reasoning with Ph.D.s. I would quote lyrics from popular songs in some of the presentations I made. I used the Rolling Stones “You can’t always get what you want” because it was suited to the reality of the under-resourcing of higher education in North Dakota.

The lines from the famous hook popped into my head again, but for a different situation. Just what was the message and to what circumstances does it apply? I guess it can mean whatever you want it to mean, but I read in the wikipedia analysis that the lyric can be translated as life involves us in optimism, followed by disillusionment, followed by pragmatism.

I somehow connected “what you want and need” with the world at this time as given to us by the Internet and social media. With the Internet, the wisdom of the Stones from the late ‘60s may have changed. Maybe, more and more, the Internet gives us what we want rather than what we need. Search has been tweeked over time so that our personal history is taken into account in responding to our queries. Our wants end up prioritized over our needs. We can adjust our Facebook feed and others can target what appears in our feed based on what is known about our preferences and interests. We do see what we want to see.

Maybe it is time to rethink getting what we want.

You can always get what you want

You can always get what want

But if you try sometime (and read more widely)

You can get what you need

 

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What is required for real innovation?

I was in college during the late 1960s and then as now it was a time of unrest and reexamination. These characteristics extended to our thinking about education. I have never been a student of history and it is probably too late to start now. How  ideas come and then go does intrigue me.  Innovation is often not that innovative.

I remember reading a couple of books during this time that proposed learner independence and self-direction. The one I remember was A. S. Neill’s Summmerhill.

According to Wikipedia, Summerhill continues to exist, but I remember the logic of the experiment as being largely discredited. Young learners were mostly not capable of making productive decisions when it came to guiding and motivating their own education. Fascination with these ideas faded.

These ideas are experiencing a Phoenix moment. Are the ideas now appropriate because of new opportunities or new demands? This is not for me to say. There are certainly new circumstances. Work opportunities, if preparation for these is a primary goal of K-12 education, are certainly changing. It seems there will be fewer “good” jobs, but these jobs will be far more lucrative. Perhaps revisiting Summerhill is a way to avoid educator responsibility – you will face far more difficult circumstances so students play your hand as you want and see what happens.

Perhaps general anxiety associated with a changed future have led to a focus on vocation and an abandonment of other educational goals. The time devoted to personal interests must be subtracted from something else. Will it be history, social sciences, arts, and/or government that are sacrificed for STEM,  entrepreneurship and explore your own passions?

Back to Summerhill. What might be proposed as a way to avoid another failed fantasy? My recommendation would be a combination of individualization through technology and mentorship. I recommend individualization with technology because I see no other way the general public will pay for a system allowing sufficient adult encouragement and oversight of individual student needs and interests without a way to free teachers from some present responsibilities. This combination will not be ideal for all students, but too many forget that many students do well with the present system. No system regarded as financially practical is ideal for all.

You see little of this type of thing in public schools, but major donors have been investing large amounts of money to explore this possibility. Mother Jones (I admit a surprising source) provides a lengthy and deep analysis of the big money folks investing in these ideas. The motives of these individuals have been quested because their ideas encourage a large role for technology and for-profit resources. Of course, paying for curriculum content is pretty much the way education gets done.

I keep hoping more public schools will involve themselves in truly innovative approaches to education, but I fear most decision makers see the personal risk as too great.

 

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Annotation as a solution to fake news

I have generated multiple posts focused on the potential of layering – adding elements of information on top of existing web pages or video authored by others (use the tag layer to view). The most common type of layered elements involves highlights and annotations. My focus has been on the educational potential of layering, but others see the potential in other ways.

Jon Udell suggests that annotation offers a way of contesting fake news. As you might expect, this opportunity has raised concerns and direct commenting on articles labeled as fake news will generate similar reactions. I admit to having less sympathy for news organizations than I might for individuals.

BTW – this Udell link gets a little geeky and explains how annotation works. The post specifically mentions Hypothes.is one of the tools I have described in an educational context.

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