Adoption

This image was retrieved from the Geek and Poke blog - while they in no way endorse my blog you should check them out for some very funny graphics on the toils of the technologically inclined. 

When I was about 12 my family tried to adopt a little girl. We went through the better part of the process before we found out that the process itself can take an extensive amount of time. Sometimes you make the decision to adopt before you really realize how complex the process is. In many cases it seems like there are roadblocks in the way just to make it difficult, while many others are in the way because of miscommunication by people with the best of intentions. Often times, these obstacles make it difficult to really understand how the entire process works and what an individual's role is in that process. Like many families, mine never did adopt that little girl because the process was so overwhelming. 


So here it is at the end of the week, four days after I should have posted my initial response to my Game Plan progress, and  I am still not sure how to react. I am a little overwhelmed. Last week I decided that I would change the general outline of my Game Plan so that it was more in line with what would be supported at my district. I reworked aspects of the plan so that they would align. Then, on Monday, the Colorado State Department of Education decided to adopt the national core common standards in English and Math. I have been trying to wrap my head about what that means for the better part of a week (and even asked my building English facilitator) so that I would be able to modify my Game Plan yet again and align it. But, as in many cases of adoption, the answers are not easy to identify, grasp, and understand. There are conflicting statements about what this adoption means in the classroom. There is misinformation on the Colorado CDE website where the old standards are posted next to the newly adopted (and newly discarded) Colorado standards without the benefit of an explanation about how the new common core standards will be woven into, or replace, the existing standards. 


One of the NETS-T standards is that teachers should take charge of their professional growth and leadership. I have been attempting to do this by attending conferences, memorizing and mapping the standards I am supposed to be teaching, and trying to find authentic ways to assess my students by using technology. Right now though, I feel as though I shouldn't be working too hard on some of these pieces because there are changes being made without thorough public explanation on how teachers are supposed to enforce or teach standards. There seems to be a, "We'll figure it out as we go!" kind of mentality and that is frustrating to me as I am in my trench. I feel like I am running in circles without the guidance of those who know how these reforms are supposed to play out and without the power to control what I have access to and what I don't. 


I have been working toward both of my initial goals surrounding digital age learning experiences and fostering creativity. On both of these fronts I believe that progress has been made. I have created online learning environments (Laureate, 2009) and outlined various activities, but I am still not quite where I want to be. I ran into a roadblock in terms of which tools I can access from my school network. I have worked around this in a few ways, by changing the tools I was going to use in one case and identifying procedures for students to follow from resources outside of the district network. I also asked for a few sites to be approved and am waiting to hear back on those currently. I also went ahead and set up social networking sites for my students so that they would already be ready to go when we use the tools in the coming weeks. In addition to setting up certain accounts for them, I read an article about how to use screencasts for student responses and have set up my ScreenCast.com website with folders for each student. 


In this way I hope to be able to model digital age work and learning. I have been reaching out to my social network to find answers to questions that I have. I joined the ISTE Young Educator group in order to find like minded people I could learn from. I am trying to reach out to others who might have a different view of a situation, but I am finding that approaching a problem from a new angle doesn't necessarily make it seem like a different problem or like less of a problem. There are simply not answers right now to the questions that I have. 


So I am modifying my Game Plan again to make sure that it is aligned as best as I can align it right now. I am trying to make the model fit into the ambiguous shape of the standards I have access to. I am not changing the goals that I have, because I still believe that digital experiences and creativity are two areas that I can continually explore. I am, however, modifying my approach to these two areas in order to be more prepared for and aligned with the goals and standards of my district. Unfortunately, right now, those goals and standards are in a state of undefined flux. It is kind of like when I was 12 and we made the decision to adopt. Sometimes the process of adoption can leave you in a state of limbo, where you aren't sure whether to move forward or not. You can not cease acting in any case though, because life goes on. 


References:


ISTE NETS for Teachers 2008. (n.d.). International Society for Technology in Education Home. Retrieved August 6, 2010, from http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForTeachers/2008Standards/NETS_for_Teachers_2008.htm


Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2009). Integrating Technology Across the Content Areas. Baltimore: Author.